Does being successful means being happy?

23 replies
Most people have dreams of being successful. It is the most important thing in this world.

I would personally agree that in this life we have, we always strive to succeed but will it really make us happy? Is it the basis to be contented in life? How do you see it?
#happy #means #successful
  • Profile picture of the author Kazooli
    Hi there,

    I see it a little different. We all know that being successful does not guarantee your happiness. The reason is because happiness cannot be found anywhere else but inside us, so it would be happiness we should be creating first before we concentrate on anything else.

    That again depends on the individual as not all are the same. At some point in our lives though all of us look back and try to place importance on those things that should be on a different priority level. Happiness and health mostly become more important as we age since wisdom shows us that's how it should be.

    One reason that most rehabilitation clinics strip you off any external sources that you may be attached to, including phone and outside contact is to do just that. To speed the recovery process to which the individual places priorities correctly.

    Sincerely,
    Kazooli
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  • Profile picture of the author elonblock
    I personally don't believe that success will make you happy. I know plenty of people who on the outside look majorly successful, but their personal life and relationships are a mess. And they will openly admit this.

    Success to some people looks like having a lot of money, or to some it may be having a loving family and so on.


    The definition of success is different for everyone. It's been my experience that everyone wants to be happy. That's human nature.

    Now the question is to go inside yourself and figure out what makes you happy. Some people are able to figure this out early in life, and some people are still trying to figure out what they want to be when they grow up.
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  • Profile picture of the author tommygunn
    I have to agree with locpi63 on this topic, my meaning of happiness is freedom, if I own a successful restaurant, there is a lot of work that would be required and likely less freedom. So I could be successful and unhappy. However if I owned a business where I come in when I like, had people that I liked working for me and cared about my business, I would likely be happy.
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    • Profile picture of the author Hesaidblissfully
      I think part of success is being happy. The reason most people want success in the first place is because they think it'll make them happy. So even if you achieve massive material success, but you're not happy, you haven't really achieved your goal.

      A good example of someone who achieves material success but fails at happiness is the character of Michael Corleone in the movie The Godfather 2. He sets out to acquire success so that his family can prosper, but in the end the things he does to get this power drive away his family. And he ends up powerful, but alone.

      That's why it's good to periodically (if not every day) remind yourself of WHY you're trying to achieve success. Ask yourself what's really important to you and what matters the most. It's not always the fancy cars and dollar signs.
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  • Profile picture of the author premiertimesol
    It may depends how successful are you,being successful is one of our happiness but not all the time.
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  • Profile picture of the author DerrickLamont
    Banned
    I really do feel success is the everything....

    what else can you base your life on, success can be a lot of things...

    it can be different for everyone, such as, making a lot of money can be success for one person, finding their true love can be success for another...

    their are many forms of success to me, if you don't have a goal to achieve some type of success what can you base your life on?
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  • Profile picture of the author christftw
    Of course, but it may just be me and not you because I consider happiness part of success, if you aren't happy then how far you've come isn't worth 2 pieces of monkey feces, and if it isn't worth anything, how can it be considered 'success'?

    JMO...
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    • Profile picture of the author usmanshakir
      Yes, happiness always depends on your success.
      More success in life means more happiness.
      Some time happiness is more important than sucess.
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      • Profile picture of the author Mark McClure
        Yes, I agree with folks who say it comes down to a personal definition of 'happiness'.

        In my view, happiness is 'peace of mind'.

        Without that mental life vest, life can be very choppy water indeed.
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  • Profile picture of the author devilishsaint
    Yup i think being happy is biggest success one can have.
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  • Profile picture of the author bozz723
    It all depends on what your definition of success is. Success to someone can be a completely different thing than success to another. My whole thing is balance.
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  • Profile picture of the author Frank Voce
    I for myself think that success brings you happiness because my definition for Success is the following: Living your life the way you want to live it (thanks Paul)
    Signature
    Frank Voce

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  • Profile picture of the author heatwave13
    Jack,
    I think that being successful as a means for happiness can be different depending on how we view the world.

    For example, in the USA, success and happiness are often based on how much money we make or how much "stuff" we can accumulate. This is a blanket statement, but I think that we do see this quite often.

    In contrast, I've been to some of the poorest parts of the world where people have nothing but, at the same time, seem to be some of the most content/happy people I have ever seen.

    Relationship oriented cultures view success/contentment differently than cultures that are more task oriented.
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  • Profile picture of the author edwinjoseph
    Being successful is not about having lots of money and material possessions. As far as I know, being successful is being satisfied and fulfilled. Most rich persons nowadays don't feel successful because they knew that there are more riches person that they. I guess in totality, the gauge for being successful is when you have the chance to sleep peacefully at night. Not thinking of any problems and worries for the next day :-)
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  • Profile picture of the author Rick B
    I think that being successful does make us happy as long as our definition of success is the correct one.

    Obviously, it's hard to be happy when you're living on the streets or your kids are going to bed hungry every night. So money is undeniably important to happiness. If you feel unhappy because Donald Trump has a better helicopter than you do though, money is probably the source of your unhappiness. There's got to be a happy medium between being a lazy bum who's home drinking beer all day and being a workaholic who doesn't realize that their son is on his school's debate team and that their spouse has someone on the side who actually spends some time with them.

    The satisfaction of doing a job well can also make us happy as long as we don't sacrifice friends and family in the effort.

    I guess it's similar to the old "work hard ... play hard" philosophy except that I'd probably reword it "work hard ... care hard ... love hard" or something like that.
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  • Profile picture of the author manadospace
    nope, for me happy or feel happy is for all human, their deserve to feel happy, some people always happy even not have much money, success but they do happy.
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  • Profile picture of the author Kenster
    Success normally brings happiness, but rarely does success boil down to only financial success.

    Be successful as a family member, a person, a friend, spiritually, and be financial successfull and you are probably happy.

    Even though you are financially successful, if you lack other types of success, you probably wont be happy.

    my two cents
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  • I think success helps with the quality of life. Life is full of the unknown. Success does very per person. For me, it helps with the happiness process.
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