What is the measure of success?!

Question from the Internet:

It’s claimed that 2% of the human population is successful. Are you part of this?

The first problem with this statement is, how do we define success? Who do we consider successful? Those who make it to the Forbes list, those who others follow and worship as celebrities and influencers.

Are we speaking about athletes who are winning medals and multi-million dollar contracts? Or are we considering world leaders, CEO’s, or the hidden lobbies manipulating leaders? The values and the goals of our modern, mostly Western society are so skewed, artificial and destructive that I am not sure we can define true success according to what most people covet these days, especially when we see that the “most successful” and celebrated people constantly fight depression, substance abuse, they get divorced and commit suicide more than average people.

Or perhaps should we look at how “happy” people are, how well they fare with their families and children, and how happy they are with whatever they have? This is more romantic but is it enough for a human being? After all, other animals also get happiness and can feel successful based on such measurements.

Moreover, since we have evolved into a globally integrated and fully interdependent world, is it even possible le that only a small percentage of people are successful and the rest isn’t. Can we say about our own biological body that only a few cells are successful while the rest is unsuccessful?

I think there are a lot of disturbing questions about this statement whoever claimed it…