The World’s Worst Kept Secret
1. Is success subjective? Can external, tangible and objective metrics really help measure success? If so, what is the correct metric or combination of metrics we should use? Is it money, fame, views, listens, clicks, impressions, goals, assists, caps or perhaps just getting a contract at any cost? What if we make an assumption that misery is the opposite of success? Can misery be distinguished from unhappiness? Is misery in a different league of negative emotion altogether? Can a person be unhappy about something but not miserable? Is it impossible to be miserable without being unhappy? Is unhappiness only an element of misery?
2. Did you know that it is supposed the average person sits around the 7 or 8 mark on a scale of 1 to 10 on the “Subjective Happiness Scale” despite financial hardship or prosperity? If happiness/unhappiness is a volatile & fluctuating variable, can it only giving a micro reading of our success in the now? Maybe it should be considered a wildly inappropriate measurement of success for something long such as a career or a lifespan? Assuming misery is the opposite of success and then further assuming unhappiness is a micro component of misery, may we also assume for now that the opposite of unhappiness is happiness? Must happiness therefore be a micro component of success?
3. Is the correct question: What is the opposite of misery?
1/3: UK Strike legend Derek Hales (168 goals in 368 games) sat down to a match day program interview in 1979 which has now earned him an unbecoming internet title in SHORTLIST'S ARTICLE: "DEREK HALES - The world's most miserable football player profile..." But is his player profile the exact opposite of this claim? Is/was he the most fulfilled and enlightened footballer who might just have been well ahead of his time? and still even today? Shall we take a closer look together...
4. Is the answer: Fulfilment?
5. How many artists or sports stars have an abundance of the above metrics such as money and fame yet still seem to despise themselves, their band-mates, fans, teammates, club or even use the metrics themselves to blamed their misery on? How much worse for that star when others like the average reasonable person on the street has an inability to understand their misery? How often have you heard “They have money, fame and achieved [X] goal but they are miserable, the ungrateful gits” or something similar? How much worse still is it when the average, reasonable person on the street makes such a statement as above but is in fact miserable themselves?! What if they have a well-paying job, a warm safe house, a beautiful partner and/or healthy and intelligent children, yet, are they most likely miserable also? Does a well-paying career mean you cannot hate it? How about a beautiful partner (outwardly) or can an a partner who is ugly on the inside generate sheer misery and hell for them? Maybe that average, reasonable person on the street is just simply an ungrateful git? Or sadly, they are just another misguided soul who never sat down to think what true success is? Are up to 60% of people miserable in their careers and their relationships? How could this be the case if they are all hitting the assumed markers success”?
6. How hard must it be to get out of bed each and every grey morning to go to a soul destroying (but well paying) job people are miserable in? How much harder to hand over that dredged out money to provide for a partner you are miserable with? Why would it be any different to a professional footballer in the stadium, a superstar DJ at a festival or rock stars on TV?
2/3: While the interviewer serves up reasonable questions, each of Hales returns are answers from the very perspective the questions were not intended to be answered from… His own subjective standard of success and enjoyments in life. The laden presumption in the questions is that certain things matter and others don’t by virtue of simply being a footballer as if all footballers are all the same or thereabouts. Hales simply enjoys scoring goals himself for the goals sake in the line of duty and isn't too bothered watching others score or how they go in once they go in while it would seem the internet posse discounts the experience of giving life to of a son as less than a suffice thrill but rather boring for a footballer rather than a human being. The most ironic part of the internet claim against Hales is that he actually states he dislikes boring people most alongside being treated unfairly/unequally. How Boring!
7. So then, is FULFILMENT the world’s worst kept secret and the ONLY true global metric to gauge success? Can you be unhappy yet fulfilled? Can you be rich yet miserable? Can you be successful without fulfilment? Can you be unhappy about having to serve 2 or 3 bad customers alongside 2-300 great ones each day from the coffee shop you built up (just how you like it and have always dreamed of) and be fulfiled? Can you be unhappy about the long sleepless nights you have while nursing a new-born baby but feel completely fulfilled that you are a parent?
8. Have you noticed not one statement has been made in this blog? Have I only asked questions of you? Why would this be important if at all? Could it be that as an agent/manager/advisor, my job isn’t to have the right answers but to seek out the right questions in order to help each clients understand their own unique path towards fulfilment and then keep them on their hero’s journey? Is it that while money is important to sustain oneself, its not the only metric required to be truly successful?
9. Is the most important tool I could use in helping my clients in obtaining a fulfilling career and life path, the use of communication? How could I ever facilitate such a monumental task for another person if I did not ask the right questions but rather just assumed money and fame was the be all and end all? How long can somebody remain in the top flight if they are miserable? Perhaps misery is not the opposite of success (failure) but itself a micro component of failure? What if to die miserably was failure while dying after having lived a fulfilled life was true success… Would you rather lay on your deathbed looking at your bank account and pass away with satisfaction of the numbers as you leave it behind in this world or would? Would you rather look over photos, stories and recant memories your epic hero’s journey with your loved ones one last time?
3/3: Hales biggest ambition in his personal life is to be happy (Perhaps fulfilled?) while his biggest professional ambition is to stay fit in order to keep doing what he loves most… What is boring about wanting to be happy like everyone else? Hales is further disinterested in superficial honors, accolades and other famous people. Here is a man who hates wasting time like road trips and cinemas and doing things not applicable to his duty of being the best striker he can be.
— Some people are so poor all they have is money.
POST SCRIPT:
Considering the above content, you may want to read this somewhat funny article below. The bizarre thing to me here is that although the interview is dry and to the point (which personally I find refreshing and humorous) Derek Hales, one of the UK’s great strike legends is being framed as “the most miserable footballer to have ever live” in this interview… Actually, he seems pretty fulfilled in life as a young man and as far back as the 70s.
Considering that his best friend is “his family” or that Hales wanted to do nothing other than to play professional football (Charlton Athletic, Derby Town, Luton Town & West Ham United) he simply outlines he only has time and focus for the things HE LOVES/ENJOYS rather than what others perceive as “successful/ happy/ enjoyable/ important”. Unimportant things just did not register on his radar, at least in this interview.
To me, Derek Hales (in this interview at least) is the model answer of what it means to be truly successful in all measure, objective, subject or otherwise. He knows the worlds worst kept secret and deserves the title of most enlightened footballer past & present but hopefully not the future.
SHORTLIST'S ARTICLE: "DEREK HALES - The world's most miserable football player profile is absolutely brilliant"