Let’s say you got LUCKY,
what now?
-you think you deserve it, naturally
-you think you’ve earned it
-you think more great things will keep happening to you, your growth will continue at this dazzling pace
Ironically it sometimes works this way,
At least you’re not lacking confidence
And you can use the accumulated material, social, miscellaneous resources
That is the bright side
There’s more downside however,
-you lack the necessary tools that this achievement / level normally requires
-requires to attain… and often requires to retain
-you have a misguided idea of what it takes, how to even match it
-but “matching” it is not enough — because the BAR is now raised
-you’re used to “changing your life” and “winning” and “ever ascending and growing” — so you’ll settle for no less
-but you not only must settle for less — you must settle for far less
So you’re really in an awkward place where you have a number of less than desirable options:
One is to just accept that you’ve merely gotten lucky,
that you’re QUITE like everyone else
and then let all your good fortune slowly waste away
and it will be just like regular WASTING of life,
except even more bitter — because you actually had a chance
Other option is to not accept this mediocrity,
It’s to stand up to the challenge
But here you also have options,
One option is to, again, accept you’re not all that,
Eat the so-called humble-pie,
And do your best to stand up to the challenge
You’re like an athlete that by chance qualified for a tourney in which he shall be the lowest ranked player — and shall receive nothing but punishment
The opportunity is to get better
The price is humiliation
A normal loser just climbs — and any improvement constitutes progress
You will be improving — and it will STILL be a regress from the apparent level you reached merely by good fortune
So the latter is more difficult
That is your challenge
You can of course do what many other fortunate clowns do
You can make yourself comfortable in this new situation in which you found yourself in
For some time — the world will actually believe you
Many domains are difficult to verify. You getting there is most of the verification there is. You being a false positive is just a matter of statistics
So you can pretend you belong there
It will of course be quite important that you yourself believe the story you’re now peddling, you must convince your own self that you’re so amazing and got here through your grit, unique outlook and sheer destiny
It will also be important so that you shall now take advantage of your position and create more good fortune for yourself, good fortune that you don’t deserve
See, REAL success is hard
Getting lucky is easy
Getting lucky is great. We should all try to get lucky.
Most of our success will come from getting lucky. From finding something we’re naturally good at, or finding ourselves at the right place at the right time
But the rest of the time, when you REALLY need to get something, but you’ve got less than the best fortune on your side…
…then you just have to EARN IT the hard way,
And that takes time
It takes years
It requires you failing many times and starting anew
It requires making sacrifices.
I’m not saying this to upset you — just to temper your expectations.
Most good things just happened to you. Most bad things just happened to you.
The rest is hard work.
BLAZING YOUR OWN TRAIL requires the real work.
I’m not saying it’s even the right thing to do — the wind can take you to many beautiful places.
I’m merely informing you that should you insist on going to some SPECIFIC place — it will be so much harder, going against the grain — and the place may not even be better than where you were heading by default
Now you know
The hidden advantage however, of blazing your own trail,
is that you never become an imposter
The hardest way is the one way which you MAYBE earned,
So that at the end you can truly say: “I BELONG HERE”
And the point of saying that is not some mere vanity, albeit the gift of profound self-respect is invaluable
The point is that you elude the POISON OF SELF-SERVING SELF-DELUSION
…The kind that you’re tempted by after you’ve gotten lucky,
when you’ve ended in a place you don’t belong to,
and now have to justify your existence there,
and have to convince yourself that you belong,
have to convince yourself that you’re someone you’re not,
and have to learn to lie to yourself,
for the rest of your fucking life
….until you can’t tell what’s real and what’s fake
and now it doesn’t even matter if you got lucky or not
Because everything is fake anyway
Fake is the only thing that matters
It’s one thing that keeps you sane
And grateful