A conversation I had with myself in the very early hours of today.
You don’t know.
You don’t know what compromises were made. What alliances were broken. What palms were greased. What lies were told. What secrets were hidden, buried. What was done to get people where they are. You don’t know that.
You DO know the world is not a meritocracy. You know people who are talented and gifted do not always get the attention they deserve. You know talented people must play to the machine (whatever that may mean for them) in order to get the machine to accept them. You know their hands cannot be squeaky clean if they get there, but they don’t tell those secrets in order to stay there. You know that.
What do you see when you look at where you are (not) versus where others you admire are?
Even though I worked my ass off and did everything I knew to do, I see that I must not have worked hard enough, or I would be where they are.
I see you did the best you could have done with the resources at your disposal. That is all.