“Despite the cult of success, people are most deeply moved not by reaching the goal, but by the grandness of the effort required to get there.” – Max Leaner
Let’s begin by defining some terms. First of all what is success? For most of us, it is simply the measure we take about whether we attained a goal we set for ourselves (although we will often pursue goals somebody else has established for us). If the goal is attained, success is claimed or ordained. Many of our goals are defined by the cultures in which we live. This suggests that there is a culturally specific "world view" of what a successful person is and it is often a function of what he or she has attained. In most Western cultures (and increasingly more Eastern cultures) this translates into "success" for an individual being generally a measure of the amount of money and property as well as social and professional status one has accumulated. For organizations, the counterparts are often shareholder value, product "sexiness", and favorable publicity. Indeed, the indicators of success are often so clearly defined by a culture that most of the culture’s members have no doubt about what is required of them if they are to be considered a successful member of that culture – and therein lies a problem.
After careers spanning sometimes decades of climbing and attaining one peak after another "successful" people are more and more often looking up and beginning to question. Why does the attainment of the latest goal not bring with it the internal experience that was imagined would be there? What was the real prize supposed to be in attaining the latest goal? Why does setting out on another quest feel so uninspiring? Who am I doing this for anyway? The pursuit of success is really about the pursuit of happiness and the pursuit of happiness is a fool’s journey. These questions lead inexorably in another direction. They lead in the direction of fulfillment.
What is fulfillment? The thesaurus provides a number of synonyms – satisfied, contented, success, happiness, joy, pleasure and gratification. Simply stated, fulfillment is the experience of being used up as I contribute to the realization of something that is personally meaningful. It is not about happiness, not about attainment, and not about acclaim, although happiness, attainment, and acclaim can most assuredly be consequences of the contribution. Fulfillment is not about anything other than me feeling that the expenditure of my life’s energy is a meaningful contribution. At some level all of us know that we have a finite number of years available to us. For the young this knowledge is all but invisible. As the years pass, however, the question of how I’m being used and how I am using me becomes more pressing. Answering these questions is what the possibility of fulfillment is about. When my eyes close for the last time, the real question I will ponder is not whether I have regrets about not attaining all my goals. The real question is whether the life I just used was used in a worthy way – did it make a difference, did it contribute to something I felt was meaningful, is my legacy something of which I am proud, was it an honorable use of a sacred energy.
Pursuing fulfillment may not make one happy. But experience indicates that happiness is, at best situational and ultimately transitory. The pursuit of fulfillment carries with it the promise of sustainability and meaning – and that is a difference worth dedicating a life towards.
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