Success

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Who are the most successful people in your life? What makes a person a success? It is my opinion that some of the poorest most uneducated people are also the most successful. Our society likes to call a certain class of people a success. Many of us probably live below the poverty line. I get frustrated with society's view. Many of my family live and work in the silicon valley. They make more than enough money. Most of them want out. I recently sang at my Father's church. Before beginning I told everyone that my favorite place to meet God was in my pasture. I had somone come up to me afterward and say that they couldn't relate because there were no pastures in the Silicon valley. I got to thinking that all those people as successful as they are by society's standards, can't get alone in the pasture. Thay can't stand in the middle of nowhere and call on their maker, and know he is listening. I used to live without that myself. Now I couldn't go back to it. My whole idea of success has changed. To me a successful person is someone who Loves and is loved in return. A successful person is someone who recognizes their place with their Creator and knows His Son. A successful person is real. They live their life and make the world better around them. It takes no money, no education, no stuff.

Little Bit Farm

-- Little bit Farm (littlebit@calinet.com), June 04, 2000

Answers

Agreed. The successful person is he who is at peace with himself. I have seen alot of people trying to escape their own head. All the money and things in the world wont make this person successful in life.

-- Hermit John (ozarkhermit@pleasedontspamme.com), June 04, 2000.

Many people in today's society measure success by gross income and by that standard I am successful also. The fact is --I spend most all of it "following a dream" and sometimes I spend more than I make. Income is a very false mark of success and material wealth is even more so. I'm going to steal a line from a song but I don't know who to give the credit to. To me success is--" The satisfaction of being understood, When people really love you and let you know when it is good" I am a simple man with only basic needs. I have faith in God. I have a wonderful wife and family that never cease to amaze me with their perseverence. I know my grandchild and she knows me. If you took away all that others judge me successful by than I still would not be a failure. I get to talk to a lot of farmers who say " I am / was such a failure" I tell them that the child clinging to their knee or the wife standing directly by their side tells me a much different story !

-- Joel Rosen (Joel681@webtv.net), June 04, 2000.

LBF, can't get past your definition to give you a decent response. Sure know my place with my Creator, am love and love others, but, like many others, I guess I'm a "failure" because I am still waiting for the Messiah.

-- Rachel (rldk@hotmail.com), June 04, 2000.

Solomon had a lot to say about the world's idea of success- he called it futility, or vanity! True success and the measure thereof will vary from person to person. My dad might have one goal such as making a certain amount of money or acheiving some musical accomplishment, whereas I felt pretty successful when I finally got the A.I. to take on my best milking goat. I think that the scriptures are pretty clear that our goal and purpose in life is to keep the Almighty's commandments and live righteously,so that even if you are dirt poor and homeless you could still be a success. To me,a successful person is one who has learned to be happy in spite of their circumstances and tries to help others. If a single mother who has managed to raise four children at home and homeschool them and homestead besides is not a success,then I don't know who would be!

-- Rebekah (daniel1@transport.com), June 04, 2000.

My Grandfather came to this country from Italy in the 1910's, he worked as a mason on the Croton Dam, and Aqueduct-then the railroad he and my Grandmother raised 6 boys, they were successful. My Father quit high school to join the navy in 1944. He married my mother had 4 kids(she stayed home) and he was a constuction worker, turned union organizer. He went for his GED and we 'graduated' together in 1976. He was very successful. Pardon my modesty, but, I, as a single mom of 3, consider myself the most successful of all. They had opportunities! I had nothing. Yet I, as thousands of other women of my generation, worked tirelessly, against all odds to raise a family! The second wave of pioneer women! Success. Such a weird, elusive,word. Success to me, today, is being content.

-- Kathy (catfish@bestweb.net), June 04, 2000.


You can hang that modesty on your neck and call it the Congressional Metal of Honor---call it my respect, to all mothers ! I am the hunter/provider--yeah right(lol)-my job ends when I stop, a mothers job ends when she quits breathing !

-- Joel Rosen (Joel681@webtv.net), June 04, 2000.

LBF, I'm with Rachel as I don't get your definition. Oh, I understand it, but I guess I disagree. If a person feels at peace and has "enough" (to eat, clothe and shelter) and is safe that is success of a kind I think.

-- Anne (HT@HM.com), June 04, 2000.

LBF, I understand your definition. I agree with it as far as it goes, you really sound angry. But while these silicon valley people can't get to a pasture, they can still know their maker, they can know he's listening. I much prefer the pasture than the city sidewalks. This may not have anything to do with the subject, but I think most people would rather have the noise, that way they can't hear themselves think. These people can't stand quiet or open spaces, or being alone. Most people would rather not be alone with their thoughts(the ones that keep the t.v. on for the noise). They don't really know how to deal with what they think or feel. And there are so many people that would rather be told what to think (t.v. does that). I do think that loneliness hits city hearts harder than country hearts. Country people, for the most part, know how to find contenment in nature and enjoy gatherings like small town festival more,-the things that a lot of city people call "corny". Older country people do more than older city folks. I used to clean for the elderly, so many of these folks give up, I don't see that near as much in the country, it's like the city folks get to a certain and figure, that's it, time to start dying. And of course their doctors rule their lives. I couldn't tell you what this has to do with what you wrote, but I'm going to post it anyway. Maybe somebody will figure it out. I think you hit something in me. (I wish I could make paragraphs.) Being alone is good most of the time (for me), but being lonely is so bad, especially for the elderly, people should seek the wisdon of the older people. Kathy, you've made me think, your statement was my thought, at first. I know a very trouble little girl, she has lived 8 places in 5 years. She is content where she lives now, but she's not happy. I'm not sure if I can agree. I think being successful is being the person God has intended you to be-a lifelong journey.

-- Cindy (atilrthehony_1@yahoo.com), June 04, 2000.

Lil Bit,

I don't think you sound angry, pensive would fit my perception better.

The most successful person in my life is my Mom. She is all that Proverbs 31 says about a gracious women. I am nothing like her in the depth of gentleness that she has and the humility and lack of guile she exhibits. But I agree with one of the above posts in that you need to keep growing into the person God wants you to be. (That's a paraphrase)

I also think it depends on whose yardstick you are using to measure with. By my own definitions, I am a success. But using the measure of someone that wants a 4000 sq. ft home with a jacuuzzi in all the 5 bathrooms, I am a dismal failure. If a person sees success in terms of possessions and the almighty $$$ I think they are never going to be content. I have always thought that if you are content you are successful.

-- Doreen (livinginskin@yahoo.com), June 05, 2000.


A successful person is someone who recognizes their place with their Creator and knows His Son.

Little Bit, I copied and pasted he above sentence from your post. this sentence, you wrote the true definition of success. Eagle

-- eagle (eagle@alpha1.net), June 05, 2000.



A successful person is someone who recognizes their place with their Creator and knows His Son.

Little Bit, I copied and pasted he above sentence from your post. In this sentence, you wrote the true definition of success. Eagle

-- eagle (eagle@alpha1.net), June 05, 2000.


Anger? I don't know that I'm angry. Frustration and anger aren't the same thing. the frustration comes from the fact that so many people miss so much by trying to rate people along the lines of their pocket books. I had/have two sets of wonderful grandparents. Both my grandfather's worked hard all their lives. Both of My grandmother's raised big families. My mother's mother was a very successful lady with only a fifth grade education. My father's mother was a very successful lady with a degree in education. My mother's father was a poor pastor who had to work in construction to make an income. My father's father worked in a nationally known olive company and served as president of that company for years. He also owns more property than I can keep up with and has incorporated into a family company to protect our assets. I guess I just got to see both sides of life all my life. As far as I'm concerned both sets of grandparents were just as successful as the other. Not because of how much they made or how much they knew, but because of how much they loved. I called my Grandfather on my father's side yesterday(my mother's parents passed away a few years ago),and my eighty-six year old granfather told me he had made a decision. He said, " I've decided I'm going to live to be one hundred." I told him that I was all for that. My grand parents, everyone of them, were tough. My grandfather told me this just a week after having back surgery. He went for months with a torn ligament in his back along with an unknown broken disc. He was in pain and yet he went to Hawaii and to South Carolina with my parents. He worked on tractors and managed to get himself run over by one one day. All this in pain most people wouldn't be able to even stand up with. He told me yesterday, "Honey, getting old is not for the faint of heart." Now you could measure my grandfather's success by his pocket book, but you would be doing him a disservice. My grandfather is worth way more than the sum of his assets. All my grandparent's are/were. So, I guess what I'm saying in this rambling way of mine is that it is honestly difficult for me to go to the city and look at all these people running around trying to get something that doesn't mean much in the first place.

Little Bit Farm

-- Little bit Farm (littlebit@calinet.com), June 05, 2000.


Little Bit, the "creator", whoever he/she may be, nor his "son" have no place in my life. Yet I consider myself successful, because I go out of my way to help other people whenever possible, to love and be loved, to be honest at all times, unless to be honest causes unnecessary pain, to "do unto others as I would have them do unto me", and I have had the true joy to have my son and two step children grow up to be contributing members of society.

I'm sorry that my spiritual needs are not congruent with yours, and I hope you will be able to accept that there are other paths to righteousness than the one you have chosen.

JOJ

-- jumpoff joe (jumpoff@echoweb.net), June 05, 2000.


Little Bit, I pray that I will always be flexible enough to walk where Jesus leads me, even when the path is not where I anticipated it would be. In other words I believe, I'm successful if I bloom where I'm planted!! I totally respect Jump-off-Joe, & his opinions-- but it won't stop me from praying for him, or anyone else that posts on this forum!(not because I am any better than anyone else --but because I care about them & that is how I believe, so I will continue to pray!) And as far, as education---I learn something everyday of my life & when I quit learning I'll be dead! I learn something from this forum everyday I come here!! And the more I come here the more I care about the families that come here & post! Sonda in Ks.

-- Sonda (sgbruce@birch.net), June 05, 2000.

my definition of a successful person is someone who is happy with his or her life ,content and kind to the earth and everything in it and leaves the world a better place than they found it.

-- carla (hillsidefarm@texoma.net), June 07, 2000.


The most successful person I know is my father. He was a poor dirt farmer who had to go off the farm to work to make ends meet -- but managed to raise eight kids with love into hardworking adults. Even now, having sold the farm, he and my mother don't have everything they would like -- or even everything that they need sometimes -- but he deals with the negatives with a smile and without ever loses his temper through frustration. I don't know a better educated person, although he didn't go past the eighth grade, he travelled the world as a teenager on merchant ships, and saw places I only dream of. He's never stopped learning (he often says that there isn't anything mankind knows that isn't in a book somewhere, and that is what libraries are for!). My university-educated husband discusses philosophy, psychology and the arts with him, and is amazed when Dad quotes Neitsze to him.

Success is not in money, or in how often your name is in the news. It comes from how many people care about you, and how many would show up on your doorstep with a sincere helping hand if you needed it. It's in how much love sits around your dinner table on a Sunday evening, and how many people you've made smile.

We never went without as children. There was always plenty of laughter and sunshine -- even if there was only one gift each under the tree on Christmas morning. But I've seen my father skip a meal, and take a basket of food to a neighbors children because they were hungry.

I'd stack him up against any "corporate elite" any day. They HAVE. He IS.

-- Tracy (trimmer@westzone.com), June 10, 2000.


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