Percy Cerutty: On Sacrifice

What you are about to read is most of one of Percy Cerutty's essential essays, On Sacrifice, the other is How To Become A Champion. It nails it, says it all. I would remind readers that the following was written sometime in the 1950's. It is applicable only for those who truly desire success.


"The thoughtful reader, having read this far, and noted the various factors that are considered the steps, or paving stones, to success, might well say--'But what about the sacrifices I must make!' or, 'What sacrifices are called for in achieving the goals you have set before me'!
The answer is simple: 'There are no sacrifices'. 'You do not have to sacrifice anything at all!'


No ambitious person: no person who has set his sights on some goal above the average or normal attainment: no dedicated person: no one willing to work, and anxious to achieve, ever considers the 'way' he has determined upon: the path he is resolved to travel: the work and suffering he sees ahead of him, and which he encounters, ever thinks of all, or any of this as a--Sacrifice.


When a man goes to night school every night in the week and studies all the weekend: when a man in sport trains, or practices, three times a day, and all the weekend, never does he feel he's making a sacrifice. It is only the mediocre, half-cocked, the spectator, or the playboy who 'assumes' that a sacrifice is being made: has been made: must be made.


The dedicated man: the ambitious person: the determined to succeed--BIG--will, in the judgement of these lesser types: those destined to mediocrity: to nonentity say, you the ambitious one: the resolved to succeed one: you--whose only 'god' is success in something: sometime: somewhere--you will be adjudged 'mad' and the lesser ones will affirm and agree--they couldn't make the necessary 'sacrifice'.


So: that is how we know them! Those who would achieve: who see the way to achievement clearly, or dimly, 'sacrifice' will be the one word they never mention--because they have no consciousness of making any 'sacrifice ' at all.


Accept it this way. For everyone who will 'go along with you': be in tune with you: support you--you must expect to find to find one hundred who will criticise you--tell you the 'sacrifices' they see--(but you don't) are not worth it.


This fact in itself makes for a certain isolation. If you are not prepared to endure(I would say 'enjoy') this separation, then believe me--you have not passed the chief test that places you in the category of the great, but has placed you in the category of those who miss out being truly great by a metre or a mile.


Summed up: finally and irrevocably--those destined to be truly great never envisage anything they may do as resulting from personal sacrifice."


I'll sum up Cerutty's words by saying this, your quest becomes part of your being, of who you are.