The Pyramid of Success is the creation of John Wooden, a legendary and renowned former basketball coach for the University of California, Los Angeles. The prolific man was a ten-time National Collegiate Athletic Association national championship winner, once doing so seven years in a row – three years longer than any other team in the league.
Suffice to say that John Wooden was a highly revered coach and has made a lasting legacy in sports history. It’s likely, then, that all that success was only possible due to years of accumulated wisdom. To coach his team, he redefined the ordinary meaning of success and taught them a new ideology via his Pyramid of Success.
The Pyramid of Success is a set of philosophical building blocks meant to help you succeed in life. This pyramid features fifteen rectangular “blocks” arranged in five tiers. Each block is held together by the Mortar. Ten additional triangular “blocks” give the pyramid the support it needs to stand proudly.
How Can You be Happy with John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success?
Initially, Wooden didn’t create the pyramid specifically for basketball, but he applied this philosophy of the pyramid to his coaching. This significantly changed the game for the UCLA Bruins, and, as it turns out, the idea can be applied to most different parts of life, too. This man’s brilliant work has laid the groundwork for his current success. Here’s how John Wooden’s pyramid of success can help you be happy.
1. John Wooden Redefined Success
John Wooden’s first foray into the beginnings of the pyramid involved changing the so-called “Definition of Success,” and it’s something we can all learn to do. Most people define successful ventures by a simple metric: did you win or lose? Did you fail, or did you not fail?
These binary concepts are simple to comprehend, but they ultimately don’t serve much of a purpose and can cause you to fall stagnant. After all, the real world is hardly ever cut and dry! John Wooden taught his players this when he was a coach. Instead of focusing on winning or losing, he focused on preparation and how the game is played.
It’s all about fundamental, profound, personal, or team improvement on a level beyond the superficial. In other words, working on internal factors molds you into the best you can be, and that is what success can be defined as. (And, naturally, more common definitions of success are easier to achieve with those improvements.)
So redefine success in your head. Instead of making it about apparent failure or obvious wins, make it about your personal goals and the ways you improve as you work toward them. But what sorts of improvements should you make? Well, that’s all in the pyramid itself!
2. The Cornerstones Of The Pyramid
Cornerstones are important features upon which structures are built, and as such, the Pyramid of Success cannot exist without its cornerstones. The two cornerstones of the pyramid are industriousness and enthusiasm, which are crucial to your happiness.
Industriousness can best be defined, simply put, at hard work. As cliche as it is, the fact remains that you cannot achieve incredible personal or external growth without working hard. A vast majority of success stories involve people who simply worked harder than those around them, and there’s no replacement for industriousness when it comes to success.
Meanwhile, enthusiasm is the fuel for the fire of industriousness. While you can certainly work hard and find success …
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