Nobody prepares you for the isolation of success. You want to tell people about it, but can't. It's difficult to look at someone struggling to survive and tell them about how you've managed to unlock the door to this incredible life.
They don't understand the struggle and sacrifice it took to get there, and it becomes difficult to communicate how you did it, because they aren't yet past that stage in their own journey.
Those that have never experienced the struggle of poverty don't gain the value of overcoming it. Those who have never escaped it, dislike those that have never faced it, and disbelieve those that have moved beyond it.
Too often the response to the story of my childhood is met with pity. The challenges I faced as a child were a difficult and painful experience, but one that taught me the tools I needed to achieve the successes I've had.
People don't ponder existence at this level of consideration, it creates too many uncomfortable questions about the nature of reality.
Nobody tells you about the fear that comes with success, the worry that the bigger you grow, the harder you'll fall.
The fear of failure is responsible for more failure than anything else, but it's something more. Success comes with an associated sense of insecurity, a kind of impostor syndrome that makes you deeply question your value.
These are things to be overcome, ideas to be rationalized away, so you can move beyond them. The only way to reach the next level is to become comfortable on this level, and this level is the least comfortable part of the overall experience.
It's that way for a reason, but you won't be able to know that reason until you're past it. Right now the world just seems cruel. The more you achieve, the harder you'll work, and the only way to move beyond it, is to relax into it.
The juxtaposition is mind boggling. It's counterintuitive, work hard, but relax into it until it stops being work, then work harder until you become consumed by it, then let it all go again.
~Zendigity
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