Merlyn C. Faris III
When I was a newlywed, my wife saw a “successful meal” through a hierarchy of descriptors. Fits the budget, prepared by herself, and on the table were the top three one the list, with “on the table” being the supreme. I however saw success through a different lense, with flavor as the primary attribute in defining a successful meal; and at that point in our marriage, bless her heart, my wife could burn water. As you can imagine, this created frustration and conflict. We were both speaking literally the same language. We were both engaged in a familiar subject matter. Yet we remained personally and interpersonally frustrated and combative because of a lack of properly understood and expressed definitions.
We see this same scenario in sports, particularly children’s sports. There are those that view success in children’s sports with the experience as their measure. These are the individuals handing out trophies, rings, and medals at every weekend tournament. They shower positive encouragement towards the child and offer the words “as long as you’re having fun, that’s what’s important.” Juxtaposed to these individuals are those that see sports as merely competition. They view success through achievement and numbers, winners and losers. There is also a group that measures success through principles. These people don’t care about the sport itself, they often may know very little about it. They don’t care about points, winning or losing. They don’t care if it was enjoyable. They measure success based on the real-life, transferable principles the child can glean from the time, money, and effort spent.
With campaign season upon us and a relentless barrage of stump speeches and attack ads I feel a bit overwhelmed and overstimulated to be honest, and I am sure I’m not alone. “Vote for ____ and America will be great again.” “Vote for ____ and America will be built back better.” Party “x” is the only thing protecting us. Party “y” is winning against tyranny. Party “lmnop” is the party winning the culture war and succeeding at progress. Party/candidate/organization “whomever” is on my team and necessary to triumph/win/succeed. All of these sales pitches for success and I am left with a question I have been contemplating for some time. It is a question I must ask and be able to answer myself first, but also should be asked of anyone with a political opinion. “What is success?” A simple question, one that I am genuinely curious to hear the answer to. Success— people chase it, lose sleep for it, rally for it, give their money to it, scream for it, grind for it, read about it, and pontificate about it. As though it is a god, people offer a sacrifice of their money, time, bodies, mental capacities, and at times even their morals and honor. Yet I am left wondering, within American politics, what is success?
Is success everyone being of one mind and in one accord? Is success in politics everyone having one religion.. or should it be as specific as one regional denomination? Is success the absolute removal and denial of all religion.. or truth..or maybe the absolute removal of the very idea of absolutes itself? Is success found in majorities and strictly numbers, such as the number of people leaving one party for another. Speaking of numbers, is success measured by dollars; such as total debt, budgets, GDP, and the like? Possibly it is measured by jobs created..but is it the number of jobs created by and for the government we count, or the ones created by and for the free market? Maybe it is measured by the number of how many people and companies are put on an assistance program? Or is it how many get off of a program of assistance that we value? Is success found in the number of businesses encouraged to leave by the “party of unions and blue collar workers” — you know, the people for the American workforce and American Made? Maybe success is found in the education industry’s outcome…or is it rather the input? Is success a bigger government or smaller government? Perhaps success is the “party of small government” championing the passage of more than 2000 bills in a four month period. Or is success measured the way Calvin Coolidge would have defined it, and found in the word “no”? Is success found in the infrastructure of war, who started a war, the finances of war, or the avoidance of war itself? Is success found in the number of agents necessary to support the size of the government and all its administrative agencies? Maybe success is a “constitutional candidate” knowing one or two sentences out of the whole governing document. Perhaps the measure of success is how much taxpayer money a candidate can get for their district. Maybe the measure is how many weeks the “Christian conservative” candidate closed down church worship services? Likewise, the measure might be found in how many executive orders the governor passed in any given state. Or is it the length of time it took for the legislators to learn the word “republic” as it pertains to such orders? Success might be linked to bank accounts, book deals, or maybe the photogenic nature of an individual and their spouse. Perhaps, success is found in feeling and energy, tone and sentiment.
Back to the overwhelming feeling mentioned before.
A dear friend and mentor of mine gave me council early in my marriage and career. This insight he bestowed upon me, I have seen play out in all spheres of my life to date. It was a lesson about roots and methods, definitions and outcomes. All summed up: a personal lack of proper definitions of success, goals, and means will surely lead to frustration. Frustration grows and grows, and gives birth to many things: blindness, reaction without reason, and entrenchment. This frustration naturally climbs the ladder further hitting the following rungs: anger, then bitterness, followed by resentment, and finally hate. This is often how businesses, marriages, careers, friendships, and churches come to an end. I wonder if governments are somehow immune.
Parties, candidates, and organizations daily inundate us with their lunchroom speeches and impossible (or at least should be impossible) promises. In flaunting their records and promises they use ambiguous terms like success, build back/great again, winning, and many others for numerous reasons. The reasons can be for another day, but for now I want to know what it means once it has been all peeled back and boiled down. What is success? How do those asking for my vote, time, and money define success. If we can get some clarity to this conundrum, what we might find is that some have intellects of tissue paper and have no clue what success is but know the right words to say in the right order. We may find some “champions” have a bit more of a tyrannical bend than we once thought. And we might find that some would rather see the whole thing burn because…well, I resent my spouse, the food sucks and the neighbors’ have it better…or because a great grandparent of my bride’s sinned, so let’s file the papers and get this thing annulled. What else we may find is an opportunity for communication and understanding. If I am going to give my support, I need to know what the vision of success looks like. When I listen to fellow Americans I want to know what defines success in American civics to them as well. Looking at the level of frustrations (and more) that have been surfacing, I have to wonder if we personally have considered it and can vocalize it to ourselves muchless to one another. The parents and children need to know if the teammates —muchless the coaches — view success as about points or punctuality, celebrating first place or celebrating the dandelion bouquet they picked in right field. They ought to know this first in order to — at minimum— manage their expectations. My wife and I were frustrated over dinner, an extremely familiar subject to the both of us. We were both speaking literally the same language. Yet we remained personally and interpersonally frustrated and combative because of a lack of properly understood and expressed definitions— definitions of success about how to successfully eat food together and satisfy our appetites; imagine the turmoil had one of us desired the neighbors’ meal or decided food isn’t necessary at all. We came from a common place of need and vernacular, and yet neither understood our own inner lexicon much less the other’s. The kids are on the same team, in the same sport, and even still there are a plethora of ambiguous reasons offered, but there is often little clear understanding as to what their sacrifices are for. Nuances need fleshed out, and the question must be answered as to what is success?
Language…communication…is a beautiful and unbelievably powerful thing, but the lack of clear definitions and common foundations in conversation will surely lead us down a path of frustration, entrenchment, reaction without reason, bitterness, resentment and so on. It’s a good thing we don’t see any of that in the history of American politics, muchless today.