success vs stardom

I was watching that reality show, "Nashville". One of the wanna-be-country-singers is the daughter of Terry Bradshaw, former Pittsburgh Steeler quarterback and now NFL commentator.

There's a conversation between the two as the daughter tries to tell her father about her dream of becoming a country singer star.

He replies to her, "I've never wanted to be a star. But what I've always wanted to be was successful."

She didn't quite comprehend that, so then he said, "well, who am I to stop you from your dreams."

But in this era of reality show televisions and instant fame or infamy as it were, I think there is a blur between success and stardom. Stardom is sometimes placed upon people who were successful, like Terry Bradshaw when he led the Steelers to four superbowls. But there are far far more successful people than there are stars. Yet it seems our perceptions, and particularly for my generation who grew up on MTV's Real Life, that we are striving for the stardom without thinking first about success and also presume that people who are stars are successful, when particularly for reality television may just be lucky.