Success α Effort²

Success is directly proportional to the square of the effort invested

From my Manipal diaries: I heard this beautiful story from Mahabharata narrated by the then main pontiff of the Udupi Krishna temple.

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Yudhistira desires to perform Ashwamedha Yagna.

He assembles his brothers and invites Sri Krishna for a meeting.

He proposes his desire in the meeting.

All the brothers agree unanimously.

Krishna being Krishna says, “Sure, sure…great idea. Just one point to ponder though. For the Yagna to succeed, either Jarasandha must voluntarily pay you obeisance, like all other Kings will OR you must defeat Jarasandha.”

Yudhistira says, “Of course. But you know we all knew that. What are you trying to say?”

Krisha responds, “Well, nothing earth-shattering. Jarasandha is no ordinary human. He is powerful. Even my mighty army ran away from him 17 times.”

Yudhistira goes pale, “Oh darn! Then forget it. If you couldn’t defeat him, then why even bother.”

Krishna says, “Oh hold on a second. That’s not why I said, what I said. I only surfaced the critical success factor in your endeavor. I didn’t say defeating Jarasandha is impossible.”

Yudhistir responds, “But Krishna, how is it possible for us to succeed where you failed 17 times.”

Bheemasena intervenes, “Bro, there are only three ingredients needed to succeed in any endeavor — commensurate effort, adequate competence, and God’s blessings. We have the competence, you believe that, right? And Krishna is right here, so we got God’s blessings also. All that is remaining is effort…so why don’t we?”

The rest is, well, history. Krishna takes Arjuna and Bheema along and gets Bheema to literally split Jarasandha into two.

When you dissect what Bheema said, it translates to an equation for success:

Success ∝ Effort * Competence * God’s Will

Assume God is always willing, God’s Will = 1

and

that we’re adequately competent, Competence = 1

Success is directly proportional to our Effort

If we’re not competent at present, not a problem. Invest effort to acquire competence. here

Success α Effort²