Challenging Philosophy of Success

A Mathematical Approach

As an Industrial Engineering student at Institut Teknologi Bandung, I'd like to challenge nowadays mainstream university students' philosophy of success with one main thesis on this writing:

I will present two premises and one theorem to support this thesis. First, let's assume that social status and wealth can be valued by numbers. This assumption is of course valid for wealth in a world with capitalism economy. Our assets and liabilities obviously can be measured in numbers.

Unfortunately, this assumption is questionable for social status. Therefore, I will put a boundary on this subject to make it valid. The numerical value of social status discussed here is determined by the rank in job position hierarchy.

The second premise is no one can have the same combination of those values. I believe this premise is valid because everyone has different fate. This assumption may be not valid because it is drawn from my personal religious belief, although statistically that's also the case.

Next, I will explain the well-ordering theorem. According to this theorem, every set can be well-ordered. That means every set always have at least one with the least value.

From these premises and theorem, I conclude that there is always at least one fortunate person in a universal set of people's social status and wealth.

As far as I remember, most of young people around me are striving for social status and wealth. They believe eventually everyone will have the so-called successful life if they worked hard enough.

Well, this kind of wishful thinking may motivates young people like me to work harder. Unfortunately, a very successful life may be impossible from the very beginning for some people. Remember the previous conclusion?

Furthermore statistically, there are way too many random factors influencing our success that we cannot control. No matter how many times media tell us zero to hero stories, we need to remember that they're just outliers. Thanks to the media, we tend to see those success stories as something highly achievable although that's not the case.

Take tech startups for example, do you know how many startups died before a company like GO-JEK, Traveloka and Bukalapak goes viral? If you don't know, please find the answer now. I know you have access to the internet if you can read this.

Unless our society is changing the concept of hierarchy in wealth and social status, it's not weird that most of people will be mediocre. I choose to believe that we cannot change capitalism economy (that fast) and we also cannot change (all people's) attitude toward favorable social status. Thus, mediocrity is inevitable for most of people.

Our society (at least mine) has told us many times that success in terms of wealth and social status is the key for a happy life, so strive for it because success will come to those who works hard. But as I explained before, this kind of success is not for everyone.

Learning this fact may be hurt, but I believe in order to be truly happy we need to embrace this fact. I still see the value in working hard because it makes people live to the fullest, but I don't think that we should be unhappy when we can't have the successful life. Because why should we worry about that kind of success, if we can't guarantee it for sure anyway?

Moreover, recent researches have shown that it is more important to invest in deep social connection if we want to have a happy life. Wealth and social status are proven not really that important, although we need a certain amount of wealth to survive. I think this fact can shift our measure of success.

Now I will end this with some of my thoughts. I believe that I should be working harder in my life. Not for the sake of wealth and social status, but for the sake of living to the fullest. I also try not to worry on my results, but focus on my next steps while maintaining a good relationship with my closest people. I'm still struggling and far from perfect, but it's okay.

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