I agree with your larger point, but I disagree with this bit: > achieving great things when you're young requires a combination of hard work, privilege, and su

I agree with your larger point, but I disagree with this bit: > achieving great things when you're young requires a combination of hard work, privilege, and supportive adults (parents/teachers/etc) and most people just didn't (or don't) have the same opportunities. I think that it's easy to externalize emotions about success in young people by projecting the help of an adult as the driving factor for that young person's success. Although this may be true in some cases, there are a large number of young motivated people who are just self-starters, with or without the resources of a backing adult. I say this because, more than privilege or adult support, I think success at a young age boils down to hard work (as you've mentioned), having passion, and being prepared for luck, i.e. taking advantage of opportunities. I think parents and teachers play a large role in the development of a person: this is obvious. What I'm not a fan of is when people lessen the success of a young person by shifting the accomplishment to be a simple cause of the environment in which they were raised, rather than the efforts and attitudes of the person who put the work in to accomplish what they did. Support ≠ doing it for them. To summarize: I agree with your larger point (to not beat yourself up when seeing a great accomplishment at a young age) but disagree that success at a young age hinges on privilege and parents over luck and perseverance.