Hypothesis for Success

To achieve any level of success (and it should be noted by this I really don't believe that success equals a monumental bank account) in any meaningful pursuit, one has to account for one's behavior and how they are going to project oneself into a position of success. Success can be measured in many ways, and for all practical purposes at this time can be considered a subjective value judgment. What success means to someone will be different from another, however justified this may be it's not my focus here today.

Rather I want to propose an objective hypothesis for how one may achieve subjective success. Objectivity here means it is agent/circumstance independent, and could be applied broadly towards any pursuit one sees as valuable and worthy of pursuing to begin with. This hypothetical theory, if it is truly objective, could theoretically be applied to all practical pursuits of success.

My hypothesis for success then rests on the balance and pragmatic use of the following two faculties, which I believe more than anything contribute to our understanding of rational human behavior: reason and passion. By reason I refer to human cognitive abilities to facilitate actions in pursuit of some desired end (this can be called 'practical' reason, as opposed to 'theoretical' reason). Passion then encompasses the broad range of our mental faculty for feeling pathological emotions, sensations, and feelings. These are wholly based on our experience and as such cannot be considered objective in themselves. However, it is objectively true that human beings - with fully functioning and stable mental faculties in place - do experience these sensations/feelings in their everyday life, hence it may be incorporated into my hypothesis.

Now, the balance between these two faculties is a struggle between our own natural tendency to feel, and our inner desire to achieve some end. Here though, success (while in its content may be subjective) needs an objective definition for this purpose. I'll define success then as relative achievement of some standards for which the achievement of these standards is innately satisfying for that agent. This definition only implies form, rather than content. For instance, if one agent desired to be the captain of his high-school basketball team, then in order for him to consider himself successful, he must (A) achieve his success - satisfy his standards for accomplishment, (B) feel relatively good about his accomplishment in and of itself.

Thus, I posit my hypothesis as the following: in order to achieve success, one must balance the manner in which his passion contorts and distracts his reason from the employment of his other faculties in achieving his desired end. In other words, the average human being's faculty of reason is, as David Hume famously said, the "slave of his passions." In other words, human emotion is the biggest obstacle confronting relative success. Passions, which are dictated by our sensible feelings towards experience, for which whose origins are themselves found only in experience, hinders our means of attaining our own success. Further, what my hypothesis includes, is that the greatest possibility of employing the means necessary for the achievement of any end insofar as one considers it success, then requires the abandonment of the enslavement of reason to passion. This presents another problem as to how one could possibly do this.

If it's true that our reason is in fact "slave to our passions," how then what are we to do about it? The only practical and efficient means for doing away with one's emotional strain on his ability to achieve ends in the abstract is for nothing more than to detach himself from the significance of experience as it relates to his emotional/sensational composition. What I propose then, is that human emotion restricts and constrains us in our ability to pursue valuable ends, even ends which (if successfully achieved) would have great social value and benefit many, not merely the individual who accomplished them. It follows too, that emotional hindrance in one's own personal achievements of success could be avoided if life was seen through more rational, rather than emotional, means.

But, how does anybody detach themselves from their emotions and feelings, which in of themselves are wholly natural and based on our personal experience?

There is no simply solution to this question; however, I could posit only one possible means for doing so. If we consider ourselves as both encompassing some form of rationality and the majority of our behavior based on our sensations/emotions; we consider ourselves (for the most part) empirical beings. By empirical, we pretty much assume the reality of our experiences and hold these to be the best case accounts for what is real, meaningful, and valuable. In other words, experience accounts for how we view everything. Important to consider though, is the basis for our own experience -- which in itself must be preceded by something (in order for any possible experience to happen). Thus, experience then is not merely the world as it exists per se, it is merely our interpretation (albeit, imperfect) of the real, physical world that exists independently of our own experiences. Thus, from this we can deduce a number of points that put much strain on the validity and reality of our own emotions (if this strain proves great enough, we can thoroughly detach ourselves from our own emotional obstacles).

If it's at least reasonable to expect that the world exists regardless of whether or not I'm around to experience it, then I can only view my personal existence (and possible experiences) with relative meaning. This means that no matter how I try to envision the overall importance of my own existence, in the end, the conclusion is the same: I really don't matter. This is quite true, for in fact after I die, it will be a small handful of people who will ever remember my existence. For which throughout the finitude of my existence nothing extremely meaningful or substantially important (in the schema of the entire world of possibly existing creatures) can be attributed to me. Likewise, my experience, which is further only important to me, makes my feelings even less significant -for they are only derived from my possible experiences. Furthermore I may deduce from these points then that my feelings, regardless of how much they dictate my life, really aren't that important in the infinite span of the universe for which I am only an insignificant spec on a broad range of possible existences for which my experiences are absolutely, 100% insignificant to anybody or anything that doesn't revolve solely around me.

This paints a pretty dim picture for our emotions. More importantly though, it puts a great strain on their usefulness insofar as being successful is concerned. Now, if my emotions do in fact hinder my ability to apply my reason in achieving ends, this must be shown in order to substantiate the explanation as to why the need for detaching emotion from reason to begin with.

The explanation lies in emotion itself. When we apply emotion, and let it dictate our actions (as opposed to cold, detached, disinterested reason), then we are placing unjustified importance on individuals, objects, subjects, groups, (whatever) unjustifiably. This hinders our pursuit of our desired ends by turning these (unjustified) objects as ends as well, for whom only we may be said to have attributed any great significance. And thus, because we have defined success as subjectively determined albeit relative to what it is not, then it follows that pathological emotion can only be an obstacle when it is used to appoint meaningfulness towards OTHER objects of our desires. This excludes the possibility that emotion could be employed as a means to an end, but that which seems only to attach instrumental value to the objections of our affection and thus would employ rational, not emotional, thinking.

Contrary to this - reason sees the world in terms not of experience with content, but forms. The most basic form is a conditional: "If I want A, then I must do B." The significance in viewing the world in this is that it only focuses my attention, faculties, and abilities in achieving anything on one desired end (the only one in which at this point in time, can be adequately called the true object of my desire). Thus, I will potentially and hypothetically (assuming what I have said here throughout this article is true!) be more successful more often and more efficiently than before.

One important thing that should be noted. There is a reason I said detach, but not wholly abandon one's emotional faculties. The emotional aspect of our being is essential, for without it, no success would be defined as nothing would have any experientially based value (and it follows that [practical] reason cannot be said to attach value to anything, for it is abstract and solely interested in forms, not content). Thus, if we wholly remove one's emotional faculty, nothing will have any importance and there would be no incentive for achieving or striving for anything, and this could not possibly be employed for the attainment of success.