Ambition

I've been thinking a lot lately about ambition.  Is too much ambition a bad thing?  Probably.  But then how much ambition is too much?  I turned to history, as I usually do, to see what others have said about ambition.

The labor rights activist, Cesar Chavez said, "We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community...Our ambitions must be broad enough to include the aspirations and needs of others, for their sakes and for our own."  If you don't know, Cesar Chavez was a Mexican American farm worker who organized peaceful protests and sit-ins (and even personally resorting to a number of hunger strikes himself) in the late 1950's and early 1960's to improve the working conditions of the mostly immigrant farm workers.  Chavez used a largely passive, but aggressive resistance that he modeled after the tactics used by Mohandas Gandhi in India and later used by the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr in the civil rights struggle of the 1960's.  Chavez later co-founded the National Farm Worker's Association (later called the United Farm Workers union).  His ambition was focused on helping others, so one could certainly argue that ambition, even too much ambition, focused on social justice and the greater good is perfectly okay.

Related to this view, the French military general and emperor, Napoleon Bonaparte had this to say about ambition (though he said it in French, obviously):  "Great ambition is the passion of a great character.  Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts.  All depends on the principles which direct them."  So, it seems that ambition can lead to harm, if the individual doesn't live by a core set of principles, values, and morals. 

Helen Keller once said, "Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet.  Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved."  The story of Helen Keller is well known, so I won't delve into more details here.  Suffice it to say, however, that she felt that character, ambition, and ultimately success are first motivated and strengthened through experience of misfortune and hardship.  Ambition here, leads one out of hardship and suffering.

Finally, the American puppeteer, Jim Henson (best known for creating the Muppets) said, "When I was young, my ambition was to be one of the people who made a difference in this world.  My hope is to leave the world a little better for having been there."  Nicely put Mr. Henson!

So, there you have it.  It seems that the Goldilocks Principle certainly applies to ambition too - not too much, not too little, but just the right amount.  Regardless, if I can take away anything from looking at these four individuals, I would say this:

1. Our ambition should be focused on the greater good of all.
2. Our ambition should be grounded in principles of ethics, values, and morals.
3. Ambition can lead us out of hardship and suffering (and more importantly, ambition can lead others out of hardship and suffering, too!).
4. We should strive to leave the world a better place.  If our ambition has done that, then we have truly found success.