The spinner on the Game of Life… I used to love spinning that colorful, numbered wheel. Perhaps if I could spin it just right, I could land on the right squares, score an occupation with a high salary, become a millionaire, and “win the Game of Life.” If only winning at real life was as easy.
But it takes a bit more to be a success in this life. Gaining tremendous wealth takes more effort than the chance spinning of a small, plastic wheel. And for many that is the full definition of success – making money. But is that really the definition of success? How should I define success? To have all that my heart desires? To have more than my neighbor? To be envied by others?
The problem is that the wrong definition of success leaves us empty – and too many of us have chosen the wrong definition.
Ravi Zacharias states: “One of the most common refrains we hear from those who have reached the pinnacle of success is that of the emptiness that still stalks their lives, all their successes notwithstanding. …judging by the remarks of some who have attained those higher standards, there is frequently an admission of disappointment. After his second Wimbledon victory Boris Becker surprised the world by admitting his great struggle with suicide. Jack Higgins, the renowned author…has said that the one thing he knows now at this high point of his career…: “When you get to the top, there’s nothing there.””
And another famous American business tycoon who achieved success in all of the ways that the world defines it indicated: “Here I am in the twilight years of my life, still wondering what it’s all about…. I can tell you this, fame and fortune is for the birds.”
“This…is one of the more difficult of life’s realities to accept. Those who have not yet experienced the success they covet find it impossible to believe that those who have attained it find it wanting in terms of giving meaning to life” (Ravi Z.).
Success based on wealth, material possessions, and fame have been found to be so empty that over and over again celebrities at the pinnacle of this type of success look for happiness in drugs and alcohol. The depression of reaching the top and finding nothing there can be so overwhelming that many of these celebrities attempt suicide. “For many in our high-paced world, despair in not a moment; it is a way of life” (Ravi Z.).
Thus, success by this definition is fatally flawed. So I’ve chosen to define my success by knowing and doing the will of God. I have found this to be so much more fulfilling. How about you? How do you define success?
God sends no one away empty except those who are full of themselves. (Dwight L. Moody)
— brian rushing