Speeches of Hyo Jin Moon 2006-2008
Delivered Sunday at Belvedere Estate in Tarrytown, New York
Hyo Jin Moon Speaks on Success, Page 201

Some episodes may contain explicit language. Listener discretion is advised.

Success

November 12, 2006

Hello.

We all want to be successful, right? Let's talk about success. What is success? What do you consider success?

In America especially, there are a lot of kids who graduate from Ivy League school—by mid-20s or late 20s a lot of people become millionaires. When you make a lot of money it does give you a lot of opportunity to move into things and do things that you want to do.

In the end success is defined by individuals. It is true because it connotes something that has to do with one's career. Is success just based on your career? A career doesn't have to last until the day you die—you can retire I guess. What's today's average retirement age, 60? It used to be 65 but it's going down right? Now it's going back up again, but anyway it's something like that.

I guess the way that we should look at success—it should be about a lifetime. It's one's lifetime and you should define it as such, because the way that we look at Father is basically that. He's a successful teacher. He's a successful father of mankind, and because of his lifetime work we define his example as something to be revered. That's what we're trying to do—to commit our life to follow that kind of exemplary life. And he's still moving on right? He didn't retire yet. I don't think he's going to retire till the day he ascends to Heaven, when he dies.

So, when I look at my family model, pretty much that's how you define success in my family. I don't know about other people, but it's my family tradition, so that's what I have to accept. I could make my own definition of success. I could define it in my own way just like everybody else in a free society. But because of what I choose to accept, that's pretty much what defines success in my family. If you can't do that, if you don't have something within you to which you can make that kind of commitment to your definition of success, then you have no goal.

You feel Father is rich and owns a lot of land. "Oh, if l acquire this land and that land, this property and that, and put it all together, then I'll have a billion dollar company." You can think like that statistically. You can think like that as if it's your right. But nobody in the world will recognize that as success. What kind of success is that? That's just privilege gone bad. That would be the reality. You can certainly do that crap if you want, but it's not success.

If I do pray, and I rarely do, but if I do pray, I pray that, "Father, you had a great start! I want your ending to be great as well." That's what I want to see happen to him. I want that to be the legacy. I don't want anything to be changed as far as that is concerned. In order to do that, even in my own family, you really have to understand Father's course. It's not that simple trying to care for other people. That's a very difficult thing, and helping people continue believing as the generations go forward, making that connection, is very difficult. Even my father is having a hard time achieving that. That's the reality. It's not that simple.

And how do you even connect to your own generation? Where is your input? Where is your sacrifice? Do you sacrifice truly for the sake of belief or do you show sacrifice for the sake of putting on a show? Which is it?

Then we should have politicians come and preach all the time in churches all around the world. Even in the secular world they try to distinguish between politicians and preachers right? Of course, they both screw up all the time, but still there's a distinction: one has to do with governing a society and one has to do with governing the hearts and minds of people, the soul of humankind. One is about the physicality more so and the other is about spirituality, right? That's the basic difference.

And there's this institution devoted to education that tries to govern, tries to manage the minds of the people, the intelligence of people.

I define success as people who give their lives to God. Wow! That is the ultimate success. There are many degrees of success. People see success in all sorts of ways, but that's how I see it. And how do I go about evaluating that success? How do I give my life to God? How does one give one's life to God? Where does it start from? 

Maybe you're lucky if you just get zapped with the Holy Spirit. (Laughter.) "I've changed. I just want to dedicate my life to God from now on." You're lucky, but most people don't. They go through all sorts of individual situations to make that determination. A lot of people do it out of desperation as well. They've got nowhere else to turn so, "I've got nothing so what the hell do I have to lose by turning my life over to God? Let him take care of my miserable situation." You can do that.