Empty Calories

Success, as a meal, is remarkably devoid of anything that actually saps my hunger. It tastes mostly like air, like a hot wind that I've been chasing. For someone with limited success in his life, this is an incredibly freeing observation and yet, a tiny bit bitter - in the way that all true wisdom tastes.

My first inkling at the taste of success was in the Navy. When I was at the Class A school learning my trade as an Intelligence Specialist, I broke every single record for educational success in the training school. I not only graduated at the top of my class, I would have graduated at the top of any class - ever. But my achievement was overshadowed by the fact that I was not offered the plum bonus of instant promotion to petty officer (a position chosen by the voted upon class leader). That position, instead, was offered to my school rival and most hated foe. My success disappeared in a moment's notice and I discounted all my work done as a frivolous waste of energy. However, as I moved throughout the remaining two years of my active duty naval career and enjoyed not being a petty officer, I realized that perhaps I had been done a favor after all - that maybe this plum bonus was not quite so plum. It didn't make my accomplishment a success, however, it merely meant that it wasn't quite such a bitter defeat.

After the Navy, I became an Assistant Manager at a movie theater. Having seen some of the other assistant managers, I quickly surmised that this was no success either - just a ribbon on a pig.

I continued to do well in school and graduated with honors from Idaho State University. This and $4.50 will get me a cup of coffee at Starbucks. So, no real success there either.

After school and back at the theater for a "short" time, I was finally offered a chance to manage a real movie theater all by my lonesome. This success, however, was certainly tainted by the fact that for the next six months I managed one of the worst theaters with some of the worst customers and in one of the worst hiring locations in the entire state. I had one day off in six months (and I do mean one day - weekends and holidays included!). My "success" only meant that I worked harder than I had before and was twice as miserable as I had been before. It did make me reevaluate my priorities though, so I guess it wasn't all bad.

When I finally left the theater business for my current job, I started as a customer service person which was fine for the short term. But after a while, I yearned for a little more and eventually was promoted to Inventory Manager/Purchasing Agent/Jack of All Products Person. At last, I had achieved a kind of success - a position that commanded a little bit of respect even if it didn't allow me the chance to open a secret bank account in the Bahamas. I worked with gusto as I took control of this position and made it my own. And then, after six months, I began to realize that what my success had really given me, other than a title, was more work and more responsibility for more pay. In essence, I had achieved... nothing, really. It was more, to be sure, but more of what?

In the last week, I wrapped my first film (more or less) and in the crowning moment of my achievement and success, I simply felt tired. I had earned this success through long hours of hard work, but in the end, all I had managed was the first step on a much longer ladder. One moment's success immediately turned to the thought of my next film and the renewed struggle to bring that one to fruition, followed by the next film, and the next film, and so on and so on. It occurred to me that writing, directing, and producing a film was not a culmination to a successful campaign, but the start to a long and arduous road of artistic exploration. I had started on the road, but I had not gone anywhere yet.

I was thinking about this last night when I started musing about young Christopher Paolini - the author of the very successful Eragon stories (the third book is coming out soon). I realized that this young man had achieved a kind of success that I had once dreamed about in high school and had done so at an age by which, at one point, I was sure I would have achieved his level of success. But then what? What will Christopher Paolini write next? Has he now become pigeonholed into his fantasy realm? Will such early success take away his drive to succeed? Or will he discover that success, ultimately, is nothing but hot air?

St. Augustine realized at a certain age that when he looked back he could see all the places where God had entered his life to bring him to Christ. I wonder too if he realized that all those disappointments and failures, as well as the illusions of success, had also contributed to bring him to where he was in life. God has an interesting way of tempering us. Sometimes it is with fire, sometimes it is with blunt force, and sometimes - like Wile E Coyote often discovers - it is with the illusion of a wall that isn't really there, so long as you're the Road Runner.

So, then, what is real success? Perhaps true success lies not in the achievement of a goal, but in the lessons learned along the way. Perhaps true success is not measured by the places we've been, so much as by the journey undertaken to reach those places. Perhaps true success is not derived from the happiness of achievement, but from the attaining of wisdom. When it comes to success, our smiles are nothing compared with God's smile upon us.

Everything else is just a meal filled with empty calories.