[HN Gopher] Your Attitude Determines Your Success ___________________________________________________________________ Your Attitude Determines Your Success Author : ingve Score : 36 points Date : 2021-03-13 20:04 UTC (2 hours ago) (HTM) web link (muratbuffalo.blogspot.com) (TXT) w3m dump (muratbuffalo.blogspot.com) | ilaksh wrote: | Good point people are making that attitude is not the whole | story. | | But it does seem that many are not aware that perseverance is | such a large part of anything. Before you get to perseverance | even, there is the desire to try. A lot of projects are dismissed | before they are even started as being too difficult or | impractical. | | One tendency that I have, which I assume other people have also, | is that in certain areas that I am invested in, I am happy to | keep working on a project despite many small or large setbacks. I | generally don't consider them to be a big deal. But other areas, | such as cooking or promotion, I put a minimal amount of effort in | and find it difficult to find motivation to continue when I have | a setback or poor result. | | Part of it is my expectation for how hard things are. Some things | that I am not particularly familiar with, I kind of expect to be | fairly straightforward. But I am starting to think that almost | every type of task is going to have setbacks and require | perseverance to get good results. Which is good news, because it | gives me hope that if I can be persistent when approaching those | types of problems, I can be just as successful as I am with | programming (when I don't give up). | christiansakai wrote: | I self talk a lot to build confidence in myself. It worked. I now | have too much confidence. | revskill wrote: | Attitude to what ? | | To boss, you have an attitude. To friends, you have an attitude. | To your serious project, you have an attitude. And many more. | ivanech wrote: | I think this is useful advice for individuals. It's also | important to know that even if everyone truly followed the | advice, some people would lose out by no fault of their own (for | instance, capitalist economies as they currently function do not | sustain full employment without government intervention - it | boils down to simple accounting identities). Macro outcomes often | are determined by other forces than the sum of individual actions | - just something to keep in mind when you see advice for | individuals. | kodah wrote: | This article seems like a big maybe to me. Attitudes _are_ | contagious and are more observed than one may realize. I work on | a platform team, many of our sibling teams wield the power and | influence of being a platform team with the grace of an angry | third grader with crayons and a blank wall. The angry third | grader _really_ used to get to me and people could see (whether I | directly told them or not) that they had affected me in some type | of way. These days, the self that I bring to work is more like a | git clone --depth 1, and as a result the angry third grader | exercises much less power over me. | | I discovered that my colleagues notice me far more than I notice | myself. I was reminded of this when I came back from a meeting | with one platform team that has treated us with notable | hostility; they frequently would backtrack statements and | commitments that weren't recorded or logged, they would make up | requirements on the spot after requirements had already been | agreed on, etc... That's the flavor of team these folks were - | everyone at the company knows it too. I was not able to get them | to budge and it was more expedient and better for our users at | this point if we just did what they wanted rather than the full | vision. My peers asked what happened, I smiled, and said, "Well, | I wasn't able to convince them to do everything, but we'll make | do and continue to plan for the future as long as it benefits our | users." In a one-on-one is when I was made aware of how my peers | observe me, most of them remarked on my stoicism and the fact | that it didn't deter me. The fact is that it does, I don't like | disorganization that becomes nearly undecipherable from gas | lighting, I don't like having goal posts moved, and I don't like | organizations that are supposed to be constantly in pursuit of | making users lives better thinking stagnation is a strategy. | Having projects cancelled affects my promotion prospects, it | wastes time/money/energy, etc... I feel some type of way about | _all_ of these things. | | From my sample size of _self_ , I think the article is right but | more in a way that _perception matters_ and you 're either the | type of person that has to: | | - git clone self --depth 1 | | - tell yourself fanciful stories | fortran77 wrote: | You'll get into a lot of trouble for suggesting this, though. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achievement_ideology | fjeifisjf wrote: | Wrong ideas deserve trouble. | zepto wrote: | Please can people stop using absolutist epithets like this. | | Managing your attitude, emotions, and the stories you tell | yourself _will help a lot_. | | If you do it badly, it will increase your chances of failure. | | Doing it well will not _determine_ your success. That's just | magical thinking. It will predispose you for success _if the | other conditions are right for it_ , but nothing more. | liuhenry wrote: | I understand what you're saying, but honest question: why is it | helpful to add this caveat? | tasty_freeze wrote: | Because "your attitude determines your success" explicitly | states that if you fail it is because of your attitude. | People fail for many reasons, usually a combination of | reasons. Attitude is just one factor. | | It is very comforting for people who are high on the social | ladder to believe in a meritocracy: it lets one their | successes are due to their superior character, and those who | are on the bottom of the ladder are there due to a failure of | character. | auganov wrote: | It doesn't say anything about the inverse. You can | simultaneously believe success is determined by yourself | and failures are just bad luck. It's positive thinking. | Some enjoy it, some don't. | croissants wrote: | > It doesn't say anything about the inverse. | | Interpreted as a literal propositional statement, it's | saying "if you have a good attitude, then you will have | success". Therefore if you do not have success, it must | be because you did not have a good attitude, which is | your fault. It's the contrapositive, right? | tux3 wrote: | You certainly _can_, and I'm all for positivity if it | helps you, but don't you think there is a contradiction | here? | | Again, if it helps go right ahead. | rektide wrote: | > why is it helpful to add this caveat? | | It's not really a caveat, though, is it? It's an entirely | false premise, that intent & direction & purpose are | irrelevant. That the primary factor that matters is attitude | & self-belief. As commenter Zepto rightly pointed out, this | article is proposing magical thinking: the conceit that what | you want or what you think is the thing that shapes reality | all about. | | Besides being delusional, it also has all the other obviously | bad impact that it's twin the Prosperity Gospel brings: those | without riches & success have all failed to be worthy, are | all faulty. No matter how hard you work, how good you try to | be, judging in Attitude or Belief as the only/primary/core | determiner of success doesn't allow for misfortune, or for it | to be the world that was wrong. Often, the world _is_ wrong, | and only those rebels that hold up their flame & let their | light shine are what it takes, what makes humankind & the | human spirit so great... but so often those folks are | crushed, too. And not for a failure of attitude or belief, | nor often strategy nor execution either. Hard things, | sometimes, ought be tried & embarked upon, but to internalize | success as the judgement of whether the hard thing was right | or wrong? That is petty, small, and insufficient. It | diminishes the light of the world to require & judge only by | success. | MeinBlutIstBlau wrote: | Being positive through the bad times helps for long term | achievement. Being naively positive through something that | has clearly ended is just stupidity. | steve_g wrote: | The caveat is helpful because there's a lot in life that you | can't control. Luck plays a part in both success and failure. | If you believe that your failures are solely your fault you | will be unreasonably discouraged . If you believe your | successes are due to you and you alone you'll turn into a | jerk. | | It's true that your attitude and behaviors matter. Competence | is usually rewarded, and you should act in accordance with | that truth. But it's not absolute. Life is not a meritocracy | (whatever that really means). | quelsolaar wrote: | I think the lesson is, no matter how good or bad you have | it, things outside your control can make it or break it, so | forget about trying to predict the future and just go for | it. | | Or as an old space pirate once put it "never tell me to | odds!" | [deleted] | varispeed wrote: | There are millions of people having such problems with | motivation, attitude and experience lack of success, so these | kind of blogs give them exactly what they want to hear. I | wasted ton of time on such publications as I was under | impression that if only I change my thinking then suddenly I'll | get on right track. Unfortunately it doesn't work like that. | What helped me the most is realising that making mistakes is | just part of a process and in order to succeed I need to be | aware of them and just keep going. It's extremely hard, but it | is what it is. If I stop then chance of failure is 100%. | MeinBlutIstBlau wrote: | That has been my experience as well. Be positive, but remove | the stars in your eyes. Don't give up at the simplest | failure, but also don't set unachievable goals that are | clearly destined for failure (such as things that require | pure luck). | ImaCake wrote: | >millions of people having such problems with motivation | | Presumably the clicks are why such pointless articles | continue to be written. | 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: | I always feel like I'm not good enough but I'm also an optimist. | I know that if I work at anything long enough I can do it. | MeinBlutIstBlau wrote: | I often know I'm not good enough, but I figure if they didn't | fire me then clearly I'm good enough. | mshea0001 wrote: | More accurate article title "Luck Determines Your Success!" | jevgeni wrote: | Probably that's what all those struggling hotel and restaurant | owners right now are missing: a can-do attitude! | quelsolaar wrote: | This is such an important lesson. The high order bit in any | success is the decision to go for it. Determination is more | important then anything. | | I worry greatly, about how young people today are thought, that's | the world is stacked against them and especially for minorities | and women. Its true that the world is a very unfair place, but to | change it we need encouragement, not horror stories. | inglor_cz wrote: | This is something I think of fairly often. | | Telling young people that the world is ruled by a clique of | powerful old white men who conspire to keep them oppressed must | be crushing, especially if done incessantly. | | A cynical part of me says: see, sowing and cultivating | frustration is precisely what some politicians need to reap | power. They might not gain as much power if their voters had | more self-esteem. | bitwize wrote: | > Telling young people that the world is ruled by a clique of | powerful old white men who conspire to keep them oppressed | must be crushing, especially if done incessantly. | | If you're a young white man with a fighting chance of | becoming one of the next generation of powerful old white | men, I can understand where you might find that unnecessarily | demoralizing. | | But for everybody else, it's the bitter truth they | nevertheless _need_ to know. And the only way to change this | is at the systemic, political level. | itronitron wrote: | Reminds me of reading a story someone wrote about the | epiphany they had when their therapist finally told them | "the world does not wake up in the morning _to fuck you_ " | sokoloff wrote: | If I were a therapist, I'd probably have that made in | vinyl and put on the ceiling over the couch. (It's one of | many reasons I could never do that job.) | fjeifisjf wrote: | Many of live in a country with a long history of laws | written explicitly for that purpose. | inglor_cz wrote: | Running a demoralization campaign on youngsters is | unlikely to improve things, though. | | Would there be an Israel today if Jewish people convinced | themselves that the world is forever going to hate and | subjugate them and that they are powerless to change it? | | They could have done so, after all, the Holocaust was an | unspeakable evil. But they chose the path of constructive | defiance. | bluefirebrand wrote: | > If you're a young white man with a fighting chance of | becoming one of the next generation of powerful old white | men, I can understand where you might find that | unnecessarily demoralizing. | | Is this really the only situation where you think this is | demoralizing? | | Not for women or minorities who are told they will never | have a chance of making it anywhere because they're not | white men? Personally I think that's pretty discouraging. | covid5throw wrote: | I think white men are more oppressed than minorities and women. | We are underrepresented in silicon valley companies [0], in | higher education [1], asians and jews far out perform us in | salary and acceptance into top universities compared to their | relative demographic proportion [2]. | | I think it is about time to start talking about asian privilege | and how white people are oppressed. I'm sure I'm going to get | downvoted, but I am completely serious in this. | | [0] https://gigaom.com/2014/08/21/eight-charts-that-put-tech- | com... | | [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/the- | degrees-o... | | [2] https://www.mindingthecampus.org/2019/06/22/are-the-doors- | to... ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-03-13 23:00 UTC)