Why to strive for greatness
I was enjoying the sunset from my balcony, swinging on the swing, and the question arose in my mind, why to work for greatness? Why should we work hard, day and night, just to die in the end and not enjoying the benefits of the work we have done? Why stress ourselves with extra work when we can get by just doing enough?
Upon bit more thinking I concluded that, this is essentially one of the fundamental questions of life.
So now, whenever I got time, between lectures, work, commute or any spare time, my mind naturally wandered off to this question. What is it that we are chasing in all this? The more I thought the more it became clear that it is out of our power and our timeline is very short for reaping any benefits posthumously.
It is apparently very clear that, since, most of the people don’t have vision of even the next 5–10 years of their life, that, we don’t do it for our generations to come. Neither do we have the insight to do it for the society, when we are that young, a very few people have that. Mostly it is our selfish nature that makes us do that, there is no business personality who would do anything just for the society, although their action may have impact on the society. So is it for just for selfish motives?
yes and no.
It is important for any person to have a goal in life. You may ask the reason, so here you go with the answer. Without any aim or goal in life, the human mind is very destructive. It is very powerful in a way which is undesirable. It is like two computers playing chess, they will stalemate themselves but will not resign or agree to a draw.
You can try it yourself leave yourself in a dark room, the first thoughts will be mostly negative. It is often that the reason behind serial killers is just the absence of life goals, no one will dream of becoming a killer. Lack of goals can sometimes lead also to depression, though there are plenty more reasons of depression.
Now since it is clear that it is for the selfish motives that you work hard, here are the reasons why it is not just selfish.
As you succeed, it will benefit a lot of people. The people who surround you will be benefited, those who work for you will be benefited, people who you work for will be benefited and the people who work for them will also be benefited, ultimately these group of people will succeed and benefit those surrounding them. Your success will touch lives and transform them in ways you can’t imagine.
Let’s take a simple task of putting up a solar panel. It will produce electricity that will in turn either save resources or will allow the electricity to reach the remotest of the population. There is a mighty possibility that some creative mind in that part of the world needed that electricity to ignite the creative in them and ultimately helping some other group of people. You may say and it is true that a lot of people do malpractices to rise to the top, but I argue that some day or the other they pay back for it. There is always a reaction waiting for them, in some form or other. Even the best businessmen and women, who are generally regarded as cunning, will give you the advice to keep it clean, it will not only keep you at peace but will also help others. The best example is of Harshad Mehta (Scam 1992) or for the Hollywood audience Jordan Belfort (The wolf of wall street). And the fall of people doing it the wrong way, will help others positively.
Finally I would like to conclude by saying that irrespective of background, occupation or profession aspire to do something great in your life!
PS. Here is an image to make you feel better
