When ambition ends, happiness begins

Climbing the Ladder of Success

by Paul Kowalewski

Every once in a while I will come across a poem, a picture, or phrase in a book that will just sort of leap out at me, begging to catch my attention. Yesterday I had such an experience while reading one of the journals of the priest and monk, Thomas Merton. One simple phrase literally stopped me in my tracks.

When ambition ends, happiness begins.

I had seen this quote many times before but never paid much attention to it in the past. I think maybe I just didn’t understand it, or maybe I didn’t believe it. After all, what’s wrong with setting goals in life and having dreams? But it struck me yesterday that to be ambitious is quite different from having dreams and hopes for the future.

Thomas Merton was a Christian Monk, but he was also a Buddhist practitioner, and I think the Buddhist teaching about “craving” best explains why you can’t be happy until you give up being ambitious.

The Buddha taught that “craving” is a poison – a great (perhaps the greatest) cause of human suffering. Craving is purely an act of a bloated ego, and it stems from a sense of exaggerated self- importance. I “crave” when I am consumed with plotting and planning to get the bigger and better – the more prestigious job, the more exalted promotion, a house in that better neighborhood.

Consumed by craving, people will often do whatever is necessary to get what they want, even if it involves crushing and stepping on other people who might be getting in their way.

Another word for “craving” is “ambition.”

When I am infected with the poison of ambition, I cannot possibly live in the present moment and experience the joy of life as it “is,” because I am always geared toward making life become what I want it to be. Ambition is the fuel of narcissism – the food that feeds a bloated ego.

In another passage, Thomas Merton also pointed out:

People may spend their whole life climbing the ladder of success,

only to find out that when they get to the top,

their ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.

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