Success

Being able to accomplish one of your personal goals can be one of the most accomplishing things in life. To be able to see the reality of something you've never thought possible by yourself is what is pure happiness. Setting materialistic desires aside, it's what people strive for in life. Self fulfillment is what makes them truly happy with themselves and who they are as a person. Successful people have the characteristics other people are too lazy to work for. To be successful in life you need to be determined, have a passion for what you're doing, and need to have a hunger for knowledge. In all three novels we've read in this class each had a successful main character. They may not seem all seem like a success story, but they are in their own way. In Bread Givers, Sara may have just accomplished the simple act of graduating college, but it was the way she got there was her success. In The Laramie Project, Matthew Sheppard may have had a terrible thing have done to him, but he was a success story because of what happened to him. He died not pretending to be something he was not. Just by him being himself, and the acts done to him, others saw and recognized the prejudice that shouldn't be done to anyone else. In Into the Wild, Chris McCandless was also a success by dying the way he truly wanted to live. He broke away from society to follow his passion and what he really wanted to do with his life.

Not letting anyone's opinions about following your passion and what you're doing with your life is a big part of success. If every time someone who was close to you voiced their opinion that they didn't approve of your passion in life or how you planned on accomplishing it, you would never be able to accomplish your goals or be who you truly wanted. If every time an obstacle was in your way from whatever your goal may be, the undetermined person would let it stop them and never be happy, but the determined person would find a way around it and overcome what's in their way. In the novel, Bread Givers, the main character Sara, never lets her oppressive father get in her way of making a better future for herself. Even if it meant leaving her home and family and relying solely on herself, she pushed herself to college and through all the obstacles that come with putting yourself through college. Determination is what made Sara never stop continuing her journey until she saw her goal become her reality. Just as Chris McCandless, never let his parent's opinion even enter his mind and have an effect on his actions towards completing his plan. He never let caring what they thought be an option and went forth with his journey as if they didn't exist.

What is the element that pushes a person to keep going? Not the actual act of determination, but something more. The hunger inside of a person to chase the pursuit just purely for the joy it brings them. What keeps you going and brings you happiness when everything else in the world fails. In the novel, Into the Wild, Chris McCandless leaves everything from his former life behind and decides to live off solely the earth and himself. Most people wouldn't dare to think about giving away their life savings or abandoning their car, but to Chris it meant something else. To Chris, stripping himself away from all of these materialistic possessions meant he was one step closer to following his passion. Every time he let go of one more thing that crutched his life of living this self reliant life on the road, it made him a tiny bit happier knowing he was on his way. As he writes in his journal, "Malnutrition and the road have taken their toll on his body. Over 25 pounds lost. But the spirit is soaring." Chris knows that he's losing weight in an unhealthy manner, but the journey he's gone through to get to that point in his life is the desire and passion driving him to keep taking his journey a step further.

 Most unsuccessful people lack the ability to be optimistic and open minded. They can't go far in the world thinking everything only has one side of it. If they're close minded then most likely it's also common that they aren't keen to learning new things or have an ever going hunger for knowledge. Successful people are always open minded when it came to new subjects, asking questions to learn everything possible is a key sign of a successful person. They apply and take advantage of what they've learned to their life. McCandless was this way exactly. It's said he was always reading and constantly keeping his brain active, with nature or hunting books learning more and more about his surroundings or what would possibly come across his path. "He was smart. He'd figured out how to paddle a canoe down to Mexico, how to hop freight trains, how to score a bed at inner-city missions. He figured all of that out on his own, and I felt sure he'd figure out Alaska too." What made McCandless successful was his eagerness to learning and attaining more knowledge about everything. Every situation he got himself into, he was able to pull himself out of just by his wits. When he was in jail for border crossing by immigration authoritites, even without an ID he was able to concoct a story to get out of. McCandless knew that knowledge was everything and the key that made him successful was his constant hunger for knowledge and never settle for just one answer.


What helps you succeed in your community?

The people who who grow up with have a lot to do with how your raised and how you see the world. Their morals and standards of living will eventually become embedded on to you subconsciously. Bringing up the concept of Nature vs. Nurture. Is someone born a certain way, or is it the people bringing you up placing ideas and beliefs in your head. The people that surround you the beginning years of your life can either make or break you. A supportive family can help you succeed at almost anything. They'd fund your dreams, or support ideas that they wouldn't see suitable for themselves, but give you the support you need because they want to see you succeed and prosper at what makes you happy. In the Laramie Project, even though Matthew was a homosexual, it didn't stop his parents from financially supporting him through college and make the family funds available to him unlike some parents who would cut Matthew off for living a lifestyle different from theirs. A supportive family is one of the most key elements that help someone succeed. With a whole family behind your decisions and choices there is an unlimited amount of possibilities. If funds were an issue, it wouldn't be because your family would find a way to make it not a problem. Any issue that comes in your way wouldn't be an obstacle with a whole unit of people behind you finding ways to help you succeed.

What if you grew up in an environment where people were constantly putting your ideas down and making you feel as an outsider. As a child growing up in that kind of environment, it can only hinder the potential your capable of throughout your life. Without the people bringing you up supporting what ideas pop in your head, your bound to fail at trying to follow your passion. Growing up with an unsupportive family is exactly what prevents success. With no back bone to support your plans every step of following your passion seems like a milestone. Without a strong will and confidence within yourself, seeing your passion become your reality only seems impossible coming from an unsupportive family. With an unsupportive family, you have no help or "get out of jail free" cards when you get in a harsh situation. The only way to succeed at what you want to do in life with an unsupportive family is to go out and do what you want to do with the expectation of being self reliant in the world. Just as Chris McCandles did in Into the Wild, he went out into the world expecting the help of no one and relying on himself and his acquired knowledge to get him out of any situation. He knew his family wouldn't have supported the idea of giving away his savings or burning his money because of their morals and beliefs and that had to to with their standard of living. Chris didn't even bother telling them his plans of going to Alaska and living off the land the whole way there because he knew he could do it himself and his family would have only become a nuisance to his success.

Being able to fund whatever desire that comes to your head is one of the biggest privileges a person can have. To have the world at your finger tips with the ease of your wallet. Any thing can be made possible when you can buy anything that will aid you in your journey of following your passion. When money isn't an issue, following whatever desire you have for your life just seems that much easier on your way to success. In the Laramie Project, Matthew was a successful student in college and didn't have to struggle for money his whole life. He never knew the life of the underprivileged who had to work their blood, sweat and tears of having to pay for your own education as Sara did in Bread Givers. When money isn't an issue, you an get a lot done a lot faster than it would take you if you didn't have money, thus getting to your goals faster.

Not being able to fund your success can also be a major factor in being unsuccessful with whatever your trying to accomplish. Having no financial support your whole life may seem like a negative factor when trying to work towards a goal, but with an optimistic personality it may seem like quite the opposite. Not having money may just seem like another obstacle fueled by your passion to keep going further. Just as in the novel Bread Givers, Sara, isolates herself from her family, and puts herself through college with the money she earned while going to school. If you're that motivated to complete your goal and follow your desire, the lack of money available to you could only want to make you work harder for the overall gratification when you've finally completed your vision. Making it to the top from starting from the bottom and knowing what kind of financial situation you started in only gives you more satisfaction with yourself when you've reached your goal. Nothing can buy the kind of satisfaction you get when you climb your way to the top starting out from nothing.