Don’t Be Fooled By The Media Effect
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Fool [noun]: a person who is duped or imposed on — Google
If you read motivational books or have read the history of the US Steel industry, then you may have come across the name Charles Schwab. He’s the darling of quite a number of motivational books and inspirational talks.
What was so special about Charles Schwab?
He was a young employee who rose through the ranks to become a celebrated Executive at the largest Steel Mill in the United States at that time. In short, he was a multi-millionaire. So much for people who say you can’t get rich working for someone else.
However what many people don’t know and most motivational discussions fail to reveal is that Charles Schwab died a pauper. And this is one of the many problems with what I call the ‘Media effect’ — a common occurrence where only the first part of a story, usually the newsworthy aspect, is told to people while conveniently ignoring (either deliberately or due to ignorance) the concluding part of the story, which in most cases is not as exciting.
I point this out because often, the media keeps feeding us with ‘principles’ of living from the lives of successful people without giving us the benefit of knowing how the lives of these ‘successful’ people turned out years down the road. In effect, the media denies us the benefit of seeing the long term effects of this principles. In addition, it denies us the opportunity of hearing stories in their full context. It is why many of us assume, for example, that wars are fought between good and evil forces as opposed to less virtuous but more accurate reasons like territorial expansion or greed or women. It is why we hear about the hits of an artist’s album but don’t hear that the record label took well over 70% of the profits. Some call it information management, others call it propaganda.
In the end it’s up to you to seek out the facts and not base the foundation of your life on hearsay, even when it comes from ‘successful’ people. Else you stand the risk on basing life-changing decisions on principles gotten from incomplete celebrity stories.
The End..
