My paternal grandfather kept a regular journal. He also held onto things of particular interest to him. Some time after his passing in 2011, my dad was searching through grandpa’s things and found a time-worn piece of paper with a quote scrawled across it in my grandpa’s handwriting:
The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward in the night.
It’s one of those quotes that falls into the overuse category among productivity gurus.
For many of them, the mantra is that you won’t get anywhere in life unless you’re burning both ends of the candle with the midnight oil.
There is no question, achieving anything requires effort. Often, to accomplish anything extraordinary requires enormous effort.
Emily Dickinson — the prolific American poet — wrote some 1,800 poems during her 55 years. Nearly all of those poems never saw the light of day, and those that did were often heavily edited; some even published without proper credit. In fact, evidence suggests that only 10 poems and a single letter were published during her lifetime with proper attribution.
It wasn’t until some years after her passing that Emily’s sister Lavinia discovered her work and made it her life’s ambition to get them published.
Lavinia died before that work was complete, but between about 1890 and 1945, most of Emily’s poems were published. In the 80 years since, Emily Dickinson has been recognized as one of the most influential American poets ever.
Dickinson poured her heart and soul into her poetry but with no audience in mind, it seems. She accomplished something great with singular focus and unrelenting drive. Did she identify, like so many of the creative minds of the last five hundred years, as one who is compelled, almost as though they don’t have a choice?
I’m not suggesting that we use Ms. Dickinson’s accomplishments as a measuring stick for our own ambitions, but even in the pursuit of a moderately difficult goal, there will always be tradeoffs in accomplishing it.
- For the first-time novelist, there are late nights and early mornings spent laboring over a bright screen in a dark room.
- For the aspiring athlete, it’s long hours training; nursing sore muscles and relentless fatigue.
- For the would-be doctor, it’s days on end with no sleep while completing residencies, making academic contributions, and trying to have some semblance of a life.
- For the parent or parents trying to raise children to be contributing members of society, there are countless hours spent laboring and worrying to help them learn their way.
While laboring toward any difficult goal, there may come a point where we question whether the dream is worth the pain and sacrifice it takes to achieve it.
Sometimes, the answer is no, it’s not worth the pain. When that’s the case, finding the courage to let that thing go can sometimes be nearly as painful as continuing the pursuit.
When the answer is that it is worth the pain, we owe it to ourselves to continue progressing — at whatever speed — toward that objective. When we feel that constant nudging toward something but don’t work for it, we are somehow diminished. As John P. Weiss put it, “Sometimes the music kind of dies in us. And then we disappear into ourselves.”
For each of us, there are times when life is overwhelming. These periods are sometimes brief and sometimes protracted, and it’s important to acknowledge that surviving in those time is, in itself, an incredible accomplishment. Beyond those moments, keep in mind that the most profound triumphs often arise from enduring hardships with resilience. Every step you take, no matter how small, brings you closer to the day when you realize that all the pain and sacrifice are the cornerstones of your success.
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