The most glamorous moments of our lives are littered on social media. They signal that we have arrived and made it. Instagram-friendly vacation pictures, workplace accomplishments, and humble brags masquerading as life advice are common signals of public success. But do they really constitute a happy and meaningful life?
I believe success is not a badge of honour. Last year, a blockchain unicorn acquired a stake in Network Capital. In the startup world, people regard it a significant milestone. I remember the media articles, interviews, congratulatory phone calls, and social media posts about the achievement. For something that started off as a passion project, it felt like a substantive outcome.
While all the external affirmations felt good, I got a chance to reflect on what happened only on a flight from Poznan to London when I was undisturbed for four hours and found the opportunity to absorb what happened. The flight was held up for hours on the tarmac, but I felt an indescribable sense of peace. In that fleeting moment, I felt infinite.
No one can really know what the future has in store or for how long the glow of success will last. All we have is private emotion. Psychologists define hedonic adaptation as the tendency to return to a set level of happiness despite life’s ups and downs. Basically, life goes on, we adapt to the new normal, and successes and failures pass. In a classic study, 80 per cent of lottery winners worth millions of dollars claimed to be no happier with their lives a few months after the supposedly life-changing outcome. In fact, most lottery winners end up broke.
Success is an intrinsic feeling that manifests between moments. For anyone who has ever felt successful in anything, how we feel about the achievement matters a lot more than perceptions. Surprisingly, we pay greater attention to the latter. It sucks the joy out of achievements and makes success a tournament for demonstrating our persona. What if we flipped the switch? What if we reflected more than we projected? I reckon we will be able to give the special moments in our lives the attention they deserve.
Failures are more complex emotions to deal with, especially private ones. To advance my point, let me introduce two mental models. The first comes from investor Nassim Nicholas Taleb who says if we can look in the mirror and reliably say we made our 18-year-old self proud, we are successful, else not. The second comes down to the simple definition of self-respect: the relationship we have with our own self.
Combining both leads me to my definition of failure. If we let our 18-year-old self down and build a poor relationship with ourselves, we fail. If not, we are okay. I have met innumerable people with illustrious resumes who liberally give wisdom about life and careers. Many of them privately regard themselves as failures for either of these reasons:
1. They compare themselves with others and drown in the misery of envy
2. They feel they have ticked all professional boxes, but never really gave a chance to their true self to explore, tinker and be
3. They don’t respect themselves even if the world around them seems to
Even when it comes to failures, we care about perceptions. Many talk about failures that make them look good and accentuate their positive qualities like resilience, can-do spirit, and sense of possibility. The script goes something like “I was broke, but I became a millionaire”, “I was rejected 10 times from X, but got a much better gig on my 11th try”, “I used to be an addict, now I am a monk”.
Personally, I love these transformation stories. Learning from the difficult experiences of others has played a pivotal role in how I think about my work and my life. However, every failure does not have an inspiring ending. Entrepreneur and investor Peter Thiel says, “Failure is neither a Darwinian nor an educational imperative. Failure is always simply a tragedy.” A part of me agrees because I don’t think that tragedies are such a bad thing. They are a part of life. Getting over this intrinsic urge to transcend every failure into something practical prevents us from truly realising its significance.
I am not inviting you to wallow in your misery and let failures be. Try and try hard, but know that how you deal with private failure will define who you become, and shape your outlook towards life. Failing and feeling compelled to give it a positive spin is disingenuous. Rather, failing in some of your pursuits, and accepting it for what it is, is maturity.
No one succeeds or fails for too long. If you can process both emotions for what they are, you will be just fine. They key is to not feel too proud when things go well and not berate yourself when things go awry.
Utkarsh Amitabh
CEO, Network Capital; Chevening Fellow, University of Oxford
Twitter: @utkarsh_amitabh