What is it that drives some people to uber-success? What drives people who become Olympic gold medal winners, self-made billionaires, Presidents of the United States?

There are of course a variety of factors. But one that psychologists seem to find consensus on is a childhood sense of loss.

In the sixties, a psychologist by the name of Martin Seligman conducted a study with the Encyclopedia Brittanica. Back then – when it was a 30-volume print product – he pulled out every volume and counted the name of the individuals with at least a ½ page of text devoted to them. He figured that people who got that much “ink” were unusually successful and this became his test group.

There were 573 such individuals, ranging from Homer to John F. Kennedy, and what Seligman then set out to do was find the common bond between these overachievers. What he found is that these notables had lost a parent (or parents) at a young age. In fact, the average age when they lost a parent was 13 years old. In random groupings of 573 random individuals, he found the average age when a person lost a parent was 19 years old. (That age has gone up as life expectancies have gone up.)

Seligman concluded that an individual who loses a parent at a young age is more inclined to compensate for this loss with some kind of “fire in the belly” than the average person.

How does Seligman’s theory apply to recent U.S. Presidents? Well, Clinton’s father died before Bill was born. Obama’s father left the family when the future President was 3 years old. George W. Bush’s father is alive, of course, although some argue that younger Bush was driven to prove himself in his father’s eyes (ditto for John Kennedy).

I have been fortunate to be close to some uber-successes and I do think there is something to Seligman’s theories – that people who achieve unusual success are driven by a need to compensate for some kind of youthful loss or hurt. One Olympic medal winner told me that he had an unhappy childhood, parents always fighting eventually leading to an unpleasant divorce. The only place he found solace was practicing his sport – that was his refuge. He was driven to be the best in the world to compensate for his unhappy home.

Obviously, no one explanation fits all. But there is something that causes a person to break from the pack – to say to himself or herself “I want/need to be ultra-successful.” These people have what psychologists call a “rage to master.”

The fact is that most people do not have a “rage to master.” Where are you on the “rage to master” scale and why?

Jim Randel is the founder of The Skinny On book series. His next book, The Skinny on Success, will be in stores soon.