Please elucidate: " Many valedictorians are not experiencing life success. Many lack necessary life affordances; so that for them it is an illusion."

Please establish a causal link between "necessary life affordances" and these valedictorians "not experiencing life success." How does their "life success" require money they lack, if that is what this means?

High academic achievement alone may not necessarily lead to life success. Today people with low academic achievements are succeeding in life because of good character and networking.

Hard work, good deeds karmic account and present situation of student's parents environment where he is, these are affects his future achievements. Last but not least that's good luck

Jim,

Thanks for your response. please read the article. It will elaborate on my synopsis. Then we can discuss this further.

Rich

I read the article. I see challenge stimulating growth, financial comfort a handicap contributing to sloth. What you apparently see as hindrance others see in retrospect as help. I'm not saying I am right and you are wrong -- I am saying that these elements are very subjective.

Ask the same question of companies: Is a govt grant of exclusivity, a kind of competitions waiver, helpful to a company or an industry? I do not think it long-term helpful, but it is more comfortable, especially short-term.

Likewise people. So many successful people cite the adversity they overcame as essential to their positive outcome. Should we ignore this?

People with failures often harbor wrong feelings about ... they are connected directly to them, as they can look at life situations from the perspective of absolute zero ie black and white. One of the most important factors in success is the patient and not the therapist . Once there is someone who really understands you. The treatment may give the patient a new and clean vision angle for a difficult problem and direct it towards the solution and thus gives the possibility to understand yourself as well as your personal goals and your values better.

The high academic achievement in high school is necessary for life success, but is non the sole factor. More important and necessary is the skill of use knowledge in practice, the courage and government politics.

Another key point about the article: There may have been financial issues -- "life's affordances" -- cited, but they were nowhere near the sole cause of the highlighted valedictorian's struggle, which to my eye was attributed to his decision to have a child with neither planning nor preparation, combined with his brother's messy, untimely, sordid accident.

Lack of money was not the sole nor the root cause of trouble cited in the article.

Success in life does not depend on academic achievement or academic achievement. Many people have higher degrees but suffer from permanent failure to make significant progress in their area of specialization. In contrast, ordinary people do not have high academic achievement. They have left a great impact on life. Or countless

I am not convinced that academic success or failure defines intelligence, it perhaps defines a high level capacity, usually taught from childhood, to order information and construct responses to it. Intelligence can involve spontaneous insight into problems allowing thereby for business success, or instinctive understanding of body movements, voice effects of a supreme actor. It allows certain kinds and levels of achievement but only some.

Stanley,

Thanks for your input. Many of these valedictorians come from difficult life experiences. I've ID 6 subtypes. I refer to these as Psychosocial Environments (PSE). I am attaching my clinical subtypings. Plus, there are at least 8 kinds of IQ.

Rich

Extremely interesting, Richard. I need to look at your work and will probably sit down tomorrow. But why difficult life experiences? Interestingly on UK TV this morning (I live in Portugal but get the shows online) an impromptu discussion arose on a show in which qualifications were discussed, and most there, successful in their fields, had not done exceptionally well academically.

If a young person goes to Oxbridge, networking plus their own family backgrounds should and would count for more than academic achievement, which, sorry to say, is perhaps only good for a university career.

Stanley,

Your input is intriguing and baffles me to explain. If you get a chance, read more about early adverse events (EAE's). Clinicians find a strong connection between these and less than optimal psychosocial functioning. One factor ID on resilience,

is related to perceived academic potential.

Thanks again,

Rich

Sir success of probability is fifty fifty, if achiever use this as a base of his future then he get success, but if he comes under the pressure of egoistic nature then he fails in his life because it is the first turning point of life.

As queen of the tangential response, I feel compelled to comment. What is success? What arena is the success found? Yes, I think that incredibly intelligent people have the chance to succeed spectacularly in life or not. As Stanley said,

social connections can mean as much as intelligence. Emotional intelligence can create networks that also guarantee success. Intelligence needs to be partnered with ambition or a driving need to achieve. Your comment about adverse life experience as a catalyst to academic achievement applies to any endeavor that is a societal measure of success.

A great question and an opportunity for my mind to spin.

brigid

Brigid,

great point about "success" and how it is subjective. In the Boston Globe research, their operational definition includes going to and completing grad school and/or beyond; a job they enjoy; pay that is commensurate to their skills; and a sense of life satisfaction to date.

Rich

Rich,

The article was sad and happy at the same time. That the inner city valedictorians were able to consider themselves fortunate even though they had not achieved the measures of success was inspiring. I didn't think about it until now, but when I graduated from university, I did not have a clue about what to do ( B A) with it. So, when dad asked me to help him with mom, I agreed. Later, I went to college for a diploma in nursing. To that end, I agree that graduates who do not have a plan or a support system that can help open doors can feel lost after graduation and be unable to achieve the success that a graduate with a network can.

Brigid

very good answers and thought.

Thank you very much

Richard, I put little value to clinicians psychosocial permutations, which always carries something of the subjective. What to me is the interesting variability of life is to them something to be categorised, described and pinned down in the fretful manner of a beautiful dead butterfly. One that they themselves have killed. Besides which, they are usually wrong.

Stanley,

There is plenty of data showing the persisting adverse impact of adverse life experiences (ALE). As a psychotherapist, these are the prime issues folks present with and what we address in their therapy. Much of what clients present is subjective; we provide the objective.

And the working therapeutic alliance accounts for 85% of a persons + response. One of the early founders of group therapy indicates: "we can be broken by the crowd, we can be fixed by the crowd.

Rich

Rich,

Do you think that high school and perhaps middle school kids should have mandatory classes in conflict resolution and problem-solving? My parents were good people they taught by example to help others, be empathetic, and do the right thing. But, they did not have a clue on how to deal with the scars of past adverse experiences. They were taught to believe it was GOD'S WILL and to accept the pain. Pain makes you stronger and if you suffer in silence and offer up the pain to GOD, HE will reward you. Mom and Dad had terrible scars because they did and they indirectly raised us to do the same. I wish that I would have learned a better way to communicate my frustrations and my joys. I also wish I would have learned how to plan for the future rather than letting GOD surprise me. As for Stanley's comment, I understand his viewpoint. What he does not allow for are the professionals who are very good at helping people and that there are people who can benefit from therapy. I was raised to be suspicious of psychiatrists if you had a problem "Talk to the Priest". I see the benefits of therapy as I listen to patients, their burdens are lighter for sharing, the bogey man isn't so scary when a light is shone on him.Certainly based on your commentaries you are a safe and beneficial ear for the fears and pains that plague.

Brigid

Richard and Brigid,

I studied and worked as a psychotherapist myself and my doubts were raised there as much as elsewhere. I have written at length for a number of years on these subjects and I am writing still. I am thoroughly against the imposition of a reality onto others . The world contains complexity . I function too as an historian and that provides me with perhaps a wider understanding of fashion in thought and the archaeology of belief and ideas. I certainly challenge the evidence of efficacy and the understanding of resolution of so called problems.

The immediate idea that problems are behind certain aspects of life, or indeed that academic lack of achievement might indicate failure, is dubious. This suggests not only that life is defined via certain fixed, strangely middleclass, processes but failing to fit into those processes indicate someone has problems . The therapist indicates what is and what is not a problem often like the most intense of couch potatoes rarely putting a single finger into the drippy, dippy mess of experience, challenge, failure, failure, challenge, success.

Nevertheless, to learn how to deal with life challenges is a different matter as perhaps suggested by Brigid .

Stanley,

You make some very interesting points. I say that as something that I can agree with. I am a visceral responder, so you will have to forgive my tendency to go off on a tangent. I am a cardiovascular nurse. When I am talking to my patients, their sadness, anger or disappointment stemming from childhood and school days seems to be a factor in their health issues. It leads the person to take actions that are not well thought out. People who equate success in a sport as a reason not to try or need to try. When LIFE doesn't agree with this notion, the person retreats into himself. One particular patient, was a high school football star, he was passed along in school because he was a star. When it came to college, he couldn't pass the courses and he lost his scholarship. He was not a big star in college (that was his evaluation) so he did no get passed on. He was bitter and blamed the system (he had a point). He got into drugs and I met him with endocarditis. SOAP BOX ALERT- not dealing with stress kills. For me, it is not that someone does not want to deal with the sticky bits of life, it is that the person has done so in a way that is physically hurting them. Sometimes, all a person needs is to be heard and given some options to deal with stress more efficiently. I CAN help you take the splinter out of your finger but can't see the tree in my own, sometimes, that is true.

I DO NOT think that psychologists though PLAY PIN THE TAIL ON THE DONKEY. If you are going to a psychiatrist or psychologist, you want help with coping. BUT, just like the stressed out smoker overweight patient that I may be caring for after a heart attack, there are automatic treatments that apply to everyone. Everyone is different in some way and needs to be treated to help them be their best, that means to me, acknowledging that bad things happen to good people. LIFE is about how you adapt. Humans exist because they learned from barren or noxious environments what needed to be done to survive and thrive.

THAT'S what I want kids to learn, do not bury the pain, do not clutch it to your heart and use it as an excuse not to try, learn whatever you can in the moment and move forward.

BRIGID

No, not necessarily. There are number of factors which determine success. For example, hardwork.

Upinder,

I agree w/ your observation. The Boston Globe research covered many students. The majority exhibited performance well below every ones expectations.

Rich

Academic achievement is one factor for life success but there are other important factors too like interest and passion

Skill based curriculum to be started at this level is very much required to reduce the un-employment than the general curriculum with high percentage record etc.,

Absolutely no correlation between high school score and success.

Dear Rose Kavitha

I think that there are people who did not try in high school and made very successful lives after as well as students who took high school seriously and applied lessons learned to advance careers and also have successful lives. It depends on definition of success and the arena that the success is measured, that is my stock answer.

brigid

Not necessary , high academic achievement in high school lead to life success, But you should be believe on hard work then success in life.

Success is a contrary creature and certainly depends on what is meant by it. Many poets had little monetary success in life, or fame, and were failures to all good purposes but now are widely known. Many novelists spent their lives in frustrating anomynity. Talent by itself is really not enough. Nonentities (that too is subject to further consideration as now fame has become democratic and not being highly gifted in an intellectual craft is not now a reason not to be celebrated) fill our lives in a similar way that in the past gifted writers and singers did. Is fame an aspect of success or simply the respect and acknowledgement of our peers?

Stanley,

Great points. I am unsure of exactly who defined "success" and the criteria that was used. The big takeaway from this protracted research is that the vast majority were not as successful as predicted in that all are valedictorians. Secondly, many could not overcome early difficult life circumstances.

Rich

In my opinion there a statement of causality between how the time is allocated to academic activities and to other life activities(family, community) https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325822646_Competing_against_Luck_The_Story_of_Innovation_and_Customer_Choicethe go theory to understand this relation is by clayton christensen " competing against luck"