OUTLIER: A Story of Success | Teen Ink

OUTLIER: A Story of Success

December 18, 2021
By AngelChen GOLD, Beijing, Other
AngelChen GOLD, Beijing, Other
11 articles 0 photos 0 comments

The pursuit of success in human society is an eternal topic. We worship winners, study and imitate them, and spend much time searching for the secret behind their success. Because life is so short, if there were such a thing as a secret, I think most people would do anything to get it.

Malcolm Gladwell has also studied these successes, interviewing and researching them to discover the little-known details behind them. Such clues may be the key to Outlier's success.
Malcolm thinks, "Personal explanations of success don't work. People don't rise from anything".
It's not to ask what successful people are like; in other words, it is only by having them where they are from that we can unravel the logic behind who succeeds and who doesn't "(Gladwell 2008, P.19). In other words, many factors influence people's success, such as environment, family, culture, and times, rather than the inevitable result of individual efforts.

I have a little question about the book or not about the book, but the human community. That is, what is the definition of success? Cambridge Dictionary defines success as "The Achieving of the Results wanted or hoped for," but in the book, the explanation seems more like "If a person has achieved nothing but has made his dream come true." The examples in this book are all famous people, so I understand them as people who have a powerful influence on human beings. But these two types are entirely different. The former if the completion of his ideal is a success, no matter how big or small; the latter seems to be more result-oriented, with wealth and influence more likely to determine a person's level of success. Therefore, in this essay, my definition of success is from the book's criteria of wealth and power.

The book author explains why a significant percentage of professional hockey is born in January, February, or March. Most players in the Premier League are born between September and November is simply because selection dates are January 1 or September. The difference in age makes physiological maturity show a vast difference. From the perspective of sociology, the so-called success is the result of "accumulative success" in a sense -- genius is not outstanding at the beginning; it is just a little bit better than others. However, the opportunities brought by these slight advantages gradually expand the direct gap between people, and then the hole and opportunity alternately play a role in producing the Matthew effect.

In my opinion, I agree with him most of the time because it is almost impossible for an individual not to be influenced by the environment in which he lives. But at the same time, rather than relying entirely on external factors, I think the choices and qualities of successful people themselves determine whether or not they will succeed.

First, people with the same background and talents make different choices and outcomes.
Math genius Bill Joy and The Beatles and psychologist Anders Ericsson have confirmed the 10,000-hour rule, who surveyed violin students at the Berlin Conservatory about their practice time. The authors further find that many computer geniuses, such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, were born around 1955. They succeeded because they were all around 20 when the first personal computer was created in 1975, and they had just gotten 10,000 hours of practice before the computer revolution. Talent shines when ability catches up with opportunity. Now let's make a hypothesis. On their trip to Hamburg, what if The Beatles felt that his love could not feed him, could not make a living, and gave up his dream to find a more practical job? What if Bill Gates and Jobs played with computers out of curiosity and gave up ahead of the computer revolution in search of a better job? Will they be known as successful and world-influential people as they are now? It won't. And the reason why this hypothesis is condemned is that this is what most people do: they give up their ideas, dreams and give in to reality. The 10,000- hour rule works because these successful people all made the same choice -- stick with it. The examples above exactly prove my point of view. Even if there are identical Beatles in parallel space, assuming that they yield to the material (which is entirely understandable) and don't choose to take their path almost paranoid to the end, things will be completely different.

Circumstances and times give us opportunities, but the more significant factor affecting our success is whether we can make the right choices to realize our value. Again, for an example out of a book, Alibaba's founder, Mr. Ma. During the university entrance exam, his grades were far away from a fractional line; when his parents let him choose between restudy and working as an English teacher, he decided to answer read. When it came to the second year's entrance exam, his score didn't pass the line again, and he resolved the answer reread a year, this time finally admitted to the famous Zhejiang university in the country. He got to know the other founders of Alibaba in college and gradually started a successful business. If he had not insisted on the way he wanted to go at that time and had become a teacher as arranged by his parents, he would not have received such higher education and entered a more talented circle, thus achieving himself through resources. From the above mentioned, we can conclude that the context of the overall environment is complete, can adhere to the self, make the right choice, is a vital factor to achieve self.

Second: Success is a "personal" thing; in a sense, I don't think it can be standardized.
There are signs of success, but they are tiny. There are as many different success stories as there are successful people. But we can't infer success from someone's experience. Many people who did not have any childhood advantages finally achieved themselves through endless efforts. People with high education and good family backgrounds end up with nothing.
To some extent, success is a coincidence that cannot be predicted or measured, so everyone's success cannot be imitated. Somehow, this kind of uncertainty is why people try their best. We can never know what the future will be like, but we will be successful as long as we stick to what we want and love. "There is half, autonomy, and a relationship between effort and reward in doing creative work, And that's worth more to most of us than money. Work that fulfills those three criteria is meaningful". If you work hard enough and assert yourself, and use your mind and imagination, "We do not know how to reform in a significant era, like now all human beings are experiencing COVID-19, and no one expects that in this seemingly stable era everything will appear and catch us off guard. We have no way of knowing which of our weaknesses can turn into opportunities and which of our strengths will be destroyed by the arrival of a new era. But in my opinion, success does not come passively as The Times conform but comes voluntarily. Every time I stretch out my hand to defeat, I will continue to stretch out my hand if I fail that time.
If there is one universal quality about successful people, they never give in to life. And the so-called "life" is the book that we do not choose the environment. Success is personalized; a thousand people have a thousand stories; we can never find a similar to imitate, can only go their way step by step.

Third: Recognize what you have to offer to succeed.
I don't know if you've seen Keigo Higashino's <The Antidote Store>, which was rushed to the big screen shortly after it was published. The book is not a story of dreams and hard work as an actual success song. The characters in the novel may have been like you, me, and him in the vast crowd, confused, hesitating, helpless, and struggling between the ideal and the reality. Their dream is terrific, but often in the face of cruel reality at a loss and the grocery store, that small mailbox also became a turning point in their fate. Sometimes, getting to know yourself is a little tricky, a laborious process. Small-town musician Kero Matsuoka is a man who loves music. For this reason, he gave up inheriting his family's fish shop, gave up a comfortable and secure life, and chose to be a musician fighting for his dream. Ichiro has always been persistent and unwilling for the status quo for life. He firmly believes that his music will shine in the world with his day-to-day efforts and the relentless pursuit of a music career. Until he did a charity performance in the orphanage when he met the talented girl Xiaoqin, the guy knew that he might never be able to realize the blueprint in his heart. This seemingly ordinary little girl can sing the original song "Rebirth" in an ethereal, clear voice only once after hearing it once. It was at that moment that he finally saw himself. As a musician, his voice lacks character, creativity lacks inspiration, and musical talent is mediocre. And art and music, in particular, are always a feast for the gifted. Success does not come easily through hard work, persistence, motivation, and work. To get ahead in your field, you must first see if you have the talents and talents to go with it. There is no shortage of people like Kerang, who can't recognize themselves in real life. Abilities can't support their ambitions, diligence can't catch up with their ideals, and efforts can't meet their expectations. Many people around me have been taking exams for many years but still can't get a pass, people who play the stock to hold on and play the shareholders, the people who have been devoted to their jobs all their lives have nothing to gain. But when they complain about heaven and earth, they can't see their problems. If they fail in exams, that's the problem of the education system; they don't care if their goals match their abilities. Investment failure is the problem of poor regulation; they do not reflect on their learning can not be down to earth. Career success means no one knows how to appreciate their situation; they can not look at their bad habits. In pursuing dreams, the most consideration difficulty may not be enough effort and perseverance. Still, they did not recognize their own from the beginning and did not find the right direction.

Above, we can see that, in addition to the overall environment, how we choose, how we know what we want, how we choose our life path also plays an indispensable role on the road to success. In many cases, even if the opportunity comes, a wrong decision can change the direction of the whole thing. Making the right choice is what everyone should learn, know themselves, understand their resources, achieve self. Of course, the arrival of success is never beneficial; the more practical you are, the more mysterious the world is to you.

Give full play to what you are good at and passionate about. "There is no innate genius," Gladwell says. "There is no born-to-be hard worker." In the end, what we want is not wealth and power but self-actualization.
 


The author's comments:

"If there is an indomitable spirit, there will be brilliance eventually."


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