Who will be the first to drive a stake through the dark heart of ambition? Young man! Ambition leads to competition. Competition leads to conflict. Conflict leads to death all over the place. See how swiftly ambition conjures conclusions. And how the mind shuts with a clanging sound and the ability to learn dies at the doorstep.
Charismatic, gun-loving, alcoholic, competitive, ruthless, compartmentalized, sexually ambiguous—few expressed the zeitgeist of post-war America with more clarity than novelist Ernest Hemingway. When his powers waned, he sank into mind-hell and shot himself.
We are successful when we enjoy what we are doing. Or not doing.
It will not be missed when it finally expires, the insane idea that I cannot pull ahead unless someone else falls behind, that in order for me to win, someone has to lose.
More is a chore. Less is best.
Men's Work 