Ambition (character trait)

Ambition is a character trait that describes people who are driven to better their station or to succeed at lofty goals.

Origin and nature

Ambition has been interpreted as the resolute culmination of a bold personal decision, but also as a receptive acceptance of an externally-provided great destiny. It can be characterized as a drive or a goal that makes the person with ambition uncomfortable until they have realized their goals. This discomfort can in part arise from the fact that the extraordinary goals that characterize ambition tend to come to public notice. David Hume called it "the most incurable and inflexible of human passions".
Various philosophers have taken different views of ambition. Aristotle described it as virtue born of the love of achieving noble purposes, though he was ambivalent about its potential ends. Philosopher Agnes Callard contrasts ambition with aspiration: in her view, ambition concerns goals with already-ascertained value: money, power, fame, and the like. Aspiration concerns goals that one does not yet fully understand the value of, but that one hopes to understand in the process of reaching for them.