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>> Because who I'd be was just another ordinary, mediocre 12-year old girl. I rubbed at the calluses on my hands, sat in front of the TV and felt terrified that

• manigandham 9y ago
  It's not a rule. It's 100% subjective and what's good enough for you is completely different than someone else. Being good at something though usually is built on some kind of goals and purpose which tends to lead to more satisfaction and fulfillment.
• im_down_w_otp 9y ago
  The thing I've always found fascinating is that this cultural ethos is in direct tension with social organization. Despite this narrative arc of the primacy of individuality we still (quite predictably) shun people who manage to actually achieve it and generally celebrate homogeny among our cohort. I couldn't enumerate the negative effects this inherent contradiction may have produced, but it seems unlikely to be a list of zero length.
• VLM 9y ago
  Ordinary is no longer economically survivable.
  • maxxxxx 9y ago
    The problem is that most of us are ordinary by definition. If it's not possible to survive as an ordinary person we have a huge problem.
    • deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  • cortesoft 9y ago
    But that is clearly not true? If it was, then over half of everyone would be dying? The average person certainly has a job and can support themselves. Our unemployment is not 50%
    • closeparen 9y ago
      Until they get sick. You do need to be an exceptional overachiever to get a job with decent health insurance.
      • Svenstaro 9y ago
        Now that's just not true. This sounds like a fairly US-centric view. In many countries you get health care taken care of if you can't afford it.
        • closeparen 9y ago
          “Society obsesses with success” is a US-centric view.
      • astura 9y ago
        Complete nonsense. The vast majority of people in the US with decent health insurance are not "exceptional overachiever[s]." Heck, I know more than a dozen people who literally sit around and watch TV 16 hours a day and have decent health insurance, including my own father who hasn't been employed in almost 40 years. To do that you just (usually) gotta be married.
  • gbacon 9y ago
    Nonsense, but you may have been brainwashed into believing it. An enormous disservice to American school kids for the past forty years has been the ad nauseum repetition that you either graduate college or you’re a failure who’s a complete drain on society. This is bollocks. After training a few years, work in some skilled trades pays six figures. Others are easily making upwards of $70k. If you can’t survive on that, tighten your belt or move to a lower cost-of-living area. Just like everyone you went to college with wasn’t a fit for med school, not everyone you went to high school is cut out for college. Learning a trade in vocational training may be exactly what they’re looking for and is definitely a path to good jobs. Earning a decent, respectable living is fine and in no way a comment on the person’s character or value or intelligence, but by painting it as “alternative school” with the connotation of a one-way track to Loserville, axe grinders have made the situation far worse. Now, it’s true that being a fry jockey — or any other job where anyone can walk in off the street and do the same task with little training — is not economically survivable, but a career that peaks at unskilled labor is far worse than ordinary.
    • sireat 9y ago
      Good point that skilled trades are still needed. However what if you fail at learning 1 or two skilled trades? Plus even those in skilled trades need to know at least the bare basics of entrepreneurship. The days of cushy union jobs are over. Not everyone is cut out to be a plumber or bricklayer either.
  • verylittlemeat 9y ago
    It comes down to economic expectations. I live below the poverty line in the United States and my life is great. My health insurance is 100% free and probably the best in the world. I get financial aid from different government sources that give me a comfortable simple life. The people who feel they need to own cars or houses and have children struggle to meet their personal expectations. Their struggle and wealth subsidies my lifestyle. I don't consider wealthy people my enemy or "rich fools." Instead I see them as people who psychologically for one reason or another have certain expectations about what life is supposed to be. They wouldn't want my life for free and I wouldn't want their life at a cost. Does my lifestyle carry a social stigma? Of course. But do I really care what someone else thinks when I'm basically allowed to live in a first world country for free? Not even a little bit. To me this is as fair as you can probably get in an economic system.
    • dominotw 9y ago
      what about traveling and seeing the world.
      • verylittlemeat 9y ago
        Do you value you that? Then live your life in accordance with achieving that goal. There are lots of ways to see the world, from being a vagrant to a CEO who travels business class to the finest hotels. I don't value travel enough to change my lifestyle so I wont work toward that end but if you do then you should. I say this with zero judgment or passive aggressive intention.
      • astura 9y ago
        Really? Many people don't want to do that, just like I don't want to play the guitar or go fishing. Many find it to be down right unethical due to the high carbon footprint required for world travel.
    • coconutrandom 9y ago
      I'm impressed, being content is as difficult as it is laudable. Do you contribute back to society in some other ways?
• dominotw 9y ago
  > this is common in th west. Common in the east too. I would imagine this is common to all human(living?) beings. I had 2 of my classmates commit suicide because they didn't achieve success at engineering entrance exam. Its one of the most vivid memories I have from my teens. I walked into our hostel and there he was lying in his bed with half eaten apple in his mouth. I think he tried to eat something sweet after downing chemical pesticide.
  • xrisk 9y ago
    India?
• 40acres 9y ago
  It's human nature to strive for something greater than ourselves. Look at all the ancient hero myths throughout history. They have very similar themes: an "ordinary" person is called to do something "extraordinary", at first they are hesitant, they struggle, they face suffering and set backs, but eventually they "slay the dragon" and come back to the village with gold. It's inspiring to strive for something better.
• scottLobster 9y ago
  Can't speak for everyone, but in my case it's because I don't have an ordinary upbringing. I grew up in a highly educated household in one of the richest areas of the United States, had educational opportunities that simply don't exist in the majority of the country. And it seems I'm naturally wired to like engineering, stemming from childhood/the toys I liked/TV shows I enjoyed/etc. All the career placement tests my high school gave me (which were extensive, multi-hour behavioral questionnaires) had engineering in the top 2 best options for me. Knowing all this, how could I throw it all away? I have no delusions of being the next Elon Musk, but I have the opportunity to work myself into the top 10% of what I do. Never mind my own internal drive (I honestly love building things, in general), but to be handed all of that opportunity and just throw it out for a mediocre career doing mediocre things would be a tacit insult to everyone who has less than me; and might do more than me given the same opportunities. Put succinctly, it would be lazy and ungrateful of me to just "settle down". Granted I started off closer to the top than most, but I imagine many people have a similar ideal relative to their starting point. Just look at immigrant families who arrived with nothing, re-use disposable plastic bags and wear the same t-shirts for years to save for their kids' college, and said kids go on to get get high-paying jobs. Accepting the "ordinary" in that context means the family remains poor.
  • dragonsky67 9y ago
    Not to be condescending, but I really feel sorry for you. There is nothing wrong with ambition, but when it becomes a prison of obligation where you feel the need to pay back the expectation of others then I feel it is misplaced. May I ask, who do you feel obligated to? Your parents or society? Is there really an obligation on you, or are you just taking on the obligation as a way of feeling special? Do you feel that if you don't achieve your "best" that society will suffer? If I were an ambitious person that I would be begging you to pursue a mediocre career. The fewer "privileged" people at the top, the more room there is for those who have not had such privilege.
    • scottLobster 9y ago
      I'd say society by definition suffers when people don't do their best. ("Best" being a function of starting point, capabilities, natural inclinations, support, etc) Do you want mediocre firemen? Mediocre janitors? Mediocre cops? Mediocre teachers? Mediocre Doctors? Of course not. What you call a "prison of obligation", I call civic duty, and I happily embrace it. Responsibility is what gives life meaning. It's what serves as a barometer for whether you wasted a day or not. Granted one has to be careful not to take on an inhuman amount of responsibility, that just leads to burnout and health consequences, but it's hardly a "prison". I've always felt good after a week of hard, productive work and empty after a week of Netflix, beer and video games. I can enjoy the latter for a day or two, maybe three, but past that I'm going to look for something more meaningful. In my case that responsibility, as far as my career is concerned, comes from my family's background. I'm fortunate enough to live in a society, however flawed, where my dad the son of an enlisted Coast Guardsman (although grandpa eventually worked his way up to Warrant Officer 3 over 20 Years) and a stay-at-home mom could work his way into the upper-middle class and provide me with everything he did. Society doesn't do this out of altruism, Western society and Capitalism in general on average reward smart people who work hard precisely so they'll contribute more to society. Granted the system is far from perfect, there's some corruption and society rewards some areas more than others, and the system is having more trouble in recent years than it's had in the past, but the general principle holds true. Conscientious people with high (but not too high) IQs are the most successful demographic: http://www.businessinsider.com/conscientiousness-predicts-success-2014-4 http://www.businessinsider.com/conscientiousness-predicts-su... (some good sources in the article) To whom much is given much is expected. Imagine our political system gave some people 1 vote and some people 1000 votes. Now 1000 votes typically won't swing a national election, but wouldn't those lucky few with 1000 votes have a greater moral obligation to use them wisely? So I run on a hybrid of internal passion and external responsibility. Passion comes and goes in waves, often my impetus for starting something, and responsibility fills in the gaps and makes sure I follow through. It's worked pretty well so far. Also it's hardly a zero-sum game at the top, particularly in engineering. You need look no further than any daily news source to see society crying out for competent individuals from all walks of life.