21 Nov 2011 —
Question
Q192: Success & Failure?
Question 192:
“Amma says: ‘The attitude “I will only accept success” is wrong. Learn to also accept the responsibility of failure.’
How do you understand this?”
Please make your answer brief and clear (maximum 5 or 6 lines).
Join the conversation! 43 Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
im not sure if there is a problem in failure if you learn from failure. like Edisons light bulb experiments, he learnt from the many failed light bulb ideas. eventually learning from his experiments he made a way to create a sucessful light bulb. A positive attitude and patience to keep on going must have been important for him
success and failure are simply two sides of the same coin; the coin of the mind. it is the ego that judges weather something is successful or a failure. be mindful of the judgments the ego makes about success and failure, then accept what is, rather than what the ego thinks it should be.
I understand we should try to accept all the situations and do our best always and be focused on the actions not just on the results. I remember a story that Amma told during satsang about a salesman that everynight, before sleep, he thinks about the negative and positive points in his day, that’s a good way to be responsible with our failure and try to change it if we really want to do it.
I think that Amma’s message here is that we should accept all the aspects of life. If we accept or value only successful moments (for us and for others), and consider failures as something to be ashamed of, we are loosing or denying a large part of the wholeness of life. Accepting failure is taking responsibility for the fullness of life, and respecting all the aspects of life as God has created it for us.
fear of getting ‘it wrong’ or the illusion of wrong, keeps me from truly learning.
The idea of ‘right and wrong’ is made up, from no understanding and false belief of what i have learnt in the world. Only True spiritual understanding leads to knowing what is true and what is not.
‘The Master’ leads ‘the me’ from untruth (failure and success) and the idea that its ‘me’ doing it. Into True understanding, and all that is happening is for a greater understanding of the Truth. For all body’s always.
It’s not reasonable or realistic to always expect success. However, it is also not right to always feel responsible for failure.
success & failures are subjective and change over a period of time to their actual meaning.when amma is there its pure ananda always no matter what we obtain life 🙂
taking responsibility for failure means not blaming others or the situation. accepting success without becoming egoistic about it is important too.
Everything in life is a lesson. Success and Failure are relative terms, because on hindsight, the lessons learnt from one’s “failure” is immeasurable and priceless. It is better to learn from life each moment as it comes instead of labeling anything as a success or a failure. Be present, be still and feel that within you at all times.
In my humble opinion, successes go to our head and failures touch our heart. Its the ego that says i will accept only success. Infact failure teaches us a lot and makes us strong. Usually we take all credit for our successes while we blame others for our failures. This is wrong. We should accept responsibility for our failures too. It makes us realise, we are not in control of everything in this world. we realise all our powers are controlled by a higher supreme power and this is the first step towards God. This makes us humble. Amma also says ”this world does not belong only to the successful, but it belongs to the losers too”.
dont take credit for successes and put the blame on others for your failures. This is what Amma is teaching thro’ the above statement.
Success and failure are the results of our own past KARMAS. So we will have to accept both equally. It is difficult to follow but we have AMMA with us. With the DIVINE NAME on our lips always we can. OM SRI RAM JAI RAM JAI JAI RAM
Success & Failure both should be accepted well in mind.Failure in something could be better for you sometimes for a better future or opportunity.Failure indeed is an opportunity to learn something from.Say yourself ‘Its good that I failed;but I am winning sometime’.
Humility is knowing your own self. We really can’t understand if we have failed or not. But we do know that with Amma’s divine guidance, perhaps we can make our life or someone elses a little better. Jai Ma!
Success and failure are part of life. Success makes us happy and failure depresses us. Just as when we face success we never ask God “why me” similarly when faced with failure we should not ask “why me”. God has his his own design to compensate the loss / failure. We only need to keep faith and keep on repeating Guru’s name in our minds.
success and failure is the result of our previous karmas and when we attribute that everything is done by the Almighty we should be happy in all his decisions.
To be balanced in success and failure. Not to be overjoyed when we succeed in doing something and not to be depressed during failure. Understanding Failure is a stepping stone to success and analysing the cause of failure as areas to be worked upon on.
The habit of accepting failures & examinations are cultivating our mind towards a successful life as well as it strengthens our mind. So that we can survive ourselves. If we always look forward for a success we will not know about failures. So the failures can give the real feeling & value of a success. The food can really gives satisfaction one who is starving for that.
mariappan
Failure is the stepping stone to success.There is always a lesson to be learned from failure.Moreover, one can only act, the result is combination of effort+time+space+destiny=Gives result + or -. no alternative but to accept it.
Rangoraths
Accept it, and don’t be identified. When you accept you remain above, you remain beyond. When you fight you come to the same level. Acceptance is transcendence. When you accept, you are on a hill, the body is left behind. . Things born will have to die. . Nothing to be worried about too much” —
Failure is part of our Karma too and That(karma) is our own doing and responsibility.When approached this way, it becomes easier to drop the victim or martyr attitude and some of the complaining.Let us remember also that society has its own interpretation of success and failure (which we internalize in most cases)..but ours might be truer to our self and needs. How to turn “failure” then into success? Embrace it as a challenge, an opportunity for self growth and maturity.. The outcome might just turn out to be breathtaking.
I feel that when one surrenders to his/her Satguru, no matter what , whether it is success or failure, it is to be accepted with the same attitude. We have to accept and thank our Guru for giving us failure which will help us to improve. We should thank Amma for success and failures.
Success & Failure are just either your or others expectations – you or someone else projects or superimposes right and wrong, good and bad, success and failure on the world. And this is the mind/ego. Amma always says about having a mind free from expectations. But the Guru or God will mould our ego to be more satwic through making the ego feel it has done wrong or failed and thus needs to try harder in order to succeed. This is a good expectation as is will help us move towards being able to transcend the mind/ego. All we need to do is recognise when it is an opportunity to grow or not. However, we can go on forever in this world of opposites or duality trying to perfect something that cannot be perfected (the ego/personality), what needs to be done it to completely transcend the mind through deep, profound mediation.
Success and failures are two sides of the same coin,some succeed to fail later, others fail to succeed later.I failed once when I was chucked out of my job, but after some time I got a better government job. That made me realize that at times failures are the step forward for better success.Every time you fail you learn a big lesson. Also there is no absolute measurement for success and failures.In every life we must face
success and failures with equal poise and calmness.
The various events of life are not much in the control of the individual except the fact that the Grace alone matters for appropriate effort is necessary. But excess tamas can cause failures which can be stopped with proper prayer.
No child of AMMA can ever possibly fail.
As AMMA surely runs and guides in trial.
There are times when we feel as if there is no way out. (Especially when one encounters a series of setbacks, for several years) Accepting sucess is so easy. But accepting failures is extremely difficult. Nevertheless, Amma’s Grace and Divine Sankalpa makes us face any situation effortlessly. Yes, Amma knows everything!!!
Amma always emphasizes the need to be a learner always. This message also reminds us the same. Unless we have this attitude to learn from failures, we never can become perfect. Life according to my opinion is Learning Incessantly From Experiences. So we should have the attitude to be responsible for our failures too. The present generation is too much concerned about their rights but not aware and responsible about commitment and sincerity. Amma’s quote tells us about this.
I feel that this statement is from the standpoint of one who is identified with the body,mind and intellect. When we think we are the doer, Amma says that we have to take success and failure in the same vein. Amma says this to drive down the point that success and failure in worldly life are two sides of a coin and if we can accept both sides with the same vision, we are saved. If we think that success is a result of our efforts, then we should also accept failure as a result of our efforts. We cannot attribute success to our efforts and failures to others mistakes.
When Bhagavan Krishna advised Arjuna the techniques of KARMAYOGA in a higher realm,our most beloved Amma advising us the same in a very simple and her own particular way.
“Yogestha: kuru karmani sangam thektva Dhananjaya
Sidhya sidhyo:samo bhutva samatvam yogauchyate”
(B.Geeta.2 48 )O Dhananjaya!!!perform the action abanding attachment being stead fast in yoga and balanced in success and failure.This is words of Bhagavan to Arjuna.Amma also saying the same.Evenness of mind is called Yoga.It is not sufficient that a true worker should act in the world,established in equipoise and equanimity,but he should,amidst the changes of the world, also reinforce this poise…
drop our personality and be happy in success and failures 🙂
There are three types of experience at the levels of our mortal existance.Pleasure and pain,gain and loss, conquest and defeat(success and failure). Pleasure and pain are the intellectual awareness of experiences favourable and un favourable. Gain and loss conception indicate the mental level ,where we feel the joy of meeting and sorrow of parting. Conquest and defeat (success and failure) indicate the physical level where in at the level of body,we ourselves win or let others win.Krishna advises in Geeta to Arjuna that one must to keep oneself in equilibrium in all these different vicissitudes at the respective level of existence. Our most beloved Amma also telling this only…
this helps in making mentally strong and able to overcome joyful or difficult situation with the same ease
I accept the success as well as the failure. Ultimately there is nothing to gain from this world. Be happy and Live happily..
We live in this world max.70-80 years or may be less.Till then we require food,clothing and a comfortable place to sleep.
To achieve the above we need money.
My greatest growth has come from my failures not successes. The lessons I have learned from failing are deeply imprinted and rooted in truth. Whereas, success may feel satisfying in the moment, but short lived, and perhaps lacking in deep meaning for me. After failure, I feel humble and mindful. After success, I feel “now what” and a little puffed up as the doer. After success I look for the next experience. After failure, I am satisfied to just be for a while in remembrance of the feet of my Lord, my Mother, my Guru.
When we come to think of it, there is no such thing as “success” or “failure”. What we think once a success might be a failure at another time and vice versa. Similarly likes and dislikes, hot and cold, pleasure and pain, day and night, dominant and recessive, hurt or heal, all are perceived as one or the other because of that particular thought of the time. I think, what Amma says is to just witness both with equal mind. Exactly the Sloka 14 of Gita chapter 2!
As Amma says when you get faiiure it is opportunity for learning.If you keep your attitude taht way then there is no success or failure but opportunities to learn.Initially it is hard to practice but listening to Amma it is not impossible.When you change the way you look at things,the things you look at change.
We must understand that real success is how unconditionally we are joyful in life, then we accept the external success and failure as being part of the game of life. With such attitude we can take responsibility of our failure. In fact failure pushes us and punctures our ego so hard that we ultimately have to surrender to providence.
we are so much trained to compete. success, by what means do i achieve success? what do i see or feel as success? somehow it is connected with our material thinking.
when i had that big big failure in my life (i needed to quit my job and everything that used to be important to me because of burnout & deep depression), i had a solid reason to reorientate myself, finding back to the spiritual, eventually being ready to meet Amma.
Success & Failure are only concepts in the mind. We have to learn to act according to Dharma, by being aware enough to feel, in any given situation, what the right course of action is. And actually, when you are in deeper states of mediation, no matter what position the body may be in, you will not have no sense of “doership”, but yet you will spontaneously perform the right actions at the right time, with efficiency and accuracy. This is the meaning of action in in-action. It’s more important not to be attached to success or failure, and to try and have no preconceived ideas about how things should be – no scheming or planning; all arises as it’s needed.
Having AMMA as Guru,we learn the meaning of the key word in life- Acceptance. Success, failure and all other experiences should be accepted as they come. As AMMA’s child, i would like to attribute all successes as the result of Her boundless Grace, and all failures as manifestations of my own limitations.
Life is a road/journey to be tread, and the path of life is full of ups and downs-successes & failures or highs & lows!
The laws of Nature embody that “ALL that goes up must come down” So we cannot expect success all the time. Success always will make us vain, proud and arrogant. Failure will make us think and analyze and each failure teaches us many lessons and pave way for a richer learning in the journey of life.
Success always follows with failure and vise versa. Failure teaches one how to come out from that to achieve success. Success cannot teach anything as failure does. Failure automatically tells us to think about God and pray to become successful. In failure only you can always be with God and his thoughts. Therefore, tame oneslef to face failure and to be with our Beloved AMMA and in her thoughts. One who accepts failure only can tame himself and achieve the goal of Success. Surrender yourself to AMMA and see, right path comes in your mind to lead you to success. Her supreme power can guide us always to success only. Believe in Her and forget about failure. Aum Amriteswaryai Namah!!
Om Namah Shivia!
I agree with those that said that ACCEPTANCE is the key. Nothing is permanant. So accept and learn from every situation.
At Amma’s feet…