What is told to a child at the losing end of a soccer game when they did not "succeed" in winning the game, yet they put forth a fair and fantastic effort? That they are a failure? Saying that to a child could be damaging. So why do we continue to use these standards of judgment to measure success? Writer Laurence Shames, in his article "The Sweet Smell of Success Isn't All That Sweet", questioned the contemporary definition of success. Shames seems to believe that the ones who were a success where the ones that set their " ...own standards titanically high." He displays his concerns about how the current notions on success are shaping the country. Although most people feel that success is the gaining of wealth and social status, true success is attempting to do something that could benefit all of society and not just the individual.
             Shames looks at success from many different angles. He begins by giving examples of "failures" such as, John Milton, Beethoven, and Socrates. He calls them "noble failures" because they didn't achieve what they had originally set out to achieve. Ironically, they achieved monumental things. He seems to imply that these "noble failures" are the truly successful. He touches upon the materialistic nature of those who follow the modern definition of success, when he wrote, "They will own homes, eat in better restaurants, [and] dress well..." However, he seems to believe that the contemporary notions of success are limiting, if not killing off, possibility;" Fewer are asking questions that matter - the ones that can't be answered." Shames suggests that we must "...agonize over questions about where [our] talents and proclivities might most fulfilling lead [us]." [The bracketed pronouns replace your and you in the original]
             The path of nobility is not always the path of sec
             ...