Most Accomplishments Are Invisible

Adam Gopnik: In my lexicon – which may be idiosyncratic but I think is also illuminating – “achievement”represents all the outer-directed, institutionally compelled things we do to advance our lives or those of our children. Getting grades, passing classes, pushing forward into select colleges. All of that. “Accomplishment” on the other hand, means... See more

And the life you will see incrementally taking shape, in the rearview mirror, will be one that meets the only definitive measure of what it means to have used your weeks well: not how many people you helped, or how much you got done; but that working within the limits of your moment in history, and your finite time and talents, you actually got aro

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I know this is controversial talk and antithetical to the success mantras of the metric obsessed, performative, materialistic, linear, Key Performance Indicator driven world we live in, but someone needs to play the role of the annoying child who questions lazily adhered to and potentially harmful conventions, if only to stress-test them. I mean, w... See more

The pressure to perform and live up to the expectations of others is not a new social phenomenon — nor a bad one. **^^But the way it manifests at the internet’s global scale increases its intensity tenfold — especially for young people. The goal is no longer to simply live up to the high expectations of your parents and peers — online you could be ... See more

So accomplishments have a cost basis. What you gain or lose is always relative to where you began. And since we all begin at different spots, there’s a range in how people feel when experiencing the same thing.