WHY SUCCESSFUL PEOPLE ARE OFTEN LABELLED ‘ARROGANT’

Whether it is: Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Tiger Woods, Lewis Hamilton, the late Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, David Beckham, Serena Williams, Usain Bolt...


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Whether it is: Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Tiger Woods, Lewis Hamilton, the late Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, David Beckham, Serena Williams, Usain Bolt etc you name the successful millionaires and billionaires past and present, and most of them will, at some point, have been labelled arrogant. So, why is this so?

The simple answer is that: to be successful, you must have uncharacteristically high self belief. Nothing and no one can stop you from achieving your goals. You are basically saying that unlike many others who often give up and throw in the towel, you are different. Yes, you may look like everyone else and may not even have a college degree to your name, you may even have come from poverty but this will not stand in your way to success.

Successful people are not ones who allow their past of negative circumstances to define who they are or indeed, what they will achieve. Can you see why this would irritate those with low self esteem, who look at these success stories and say: “How dare you be so arrogant?” They ask since it is their belief that success is not for average people like you and I, that it is only for the privileged few…” they say to themselves to excuse their own lack of progress.

Many of those who label such high achievers as arrogant, are those I will refer to as the “left behinders”. These people could have gone to the same school as successful people, they may have even been brought up in the same neighbourhood, perhaps they once worked for the same companies and yet somehow, the high achiever managed to leave them behind. Bitterness has now crept in.

For a leftbehinder to give credit to someone who has achieved so much would mean he/she (the leftbehinder), has to acknowledge one fact: that they too perhaps had access to the same opportunities but did not grab them unlike their successful friend. For leftbehinders, this fact is difficult to accept and so they peddle their stories about their “arrogant” friend to anyone willing to listen. They may even claim to be the reason for this success (yes “leftbehinders” will even credit the pen they leant someone when they were both aged 7, as the reason for this person’s success at 22+).

You may find that the leftbehinder may at one time, have even been offered the chance to share in this success story but at the time, dismissed the achiever as a dreamer. It is a well known fact that in the early days, a number of people turned down Steve Job’s job offer(s) and some even turned down shares in Apple, preferring instead, to work for other companies. I wonder how they are feeling now, as they watch Apple over the last years, become more powerful than many countries in the world. Yes, Steve Jobs was not easy to work for, but successful people often question everything and not accept mediocre work.

Now, no one is saying that working for such ambitious characters is easy – No. Indeed, it is said that Elon Musk (PayPal co-founder and now CEO Tesla & SpaceX) works around100+ hours per week – this is not someone who will accept people logging in at 9am and off at 5pm but still want the glory of success. Most people know that to become successful takes guts, hard work and determination with little patience for laziness. You cannot be lazy and then wonder why successful people have no time for you – this is because they have an agenda and you are standing in their way. They value themselves and their time. Remember, it is not for the world to stop or slow down to your pace, it is for you to keep up with the world – for it is moving with or without you. So, get on the train or risk becoming another “leftbehinder”.

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  1. Ravi       Reply

    Nicely explained. I also write articles.. on my blog shashikantsinghblog.wordpress.com