You Are Not ‘Behind’ (2016)
Here&#x27;s what I would tell my kids: &quot;Odds are, you ARE behind. In any given rank ordering, 50% are below average. 90% are NOT in the top 10%<p>If you&#x27;re lucky and work hard, you can be in the top 10%, 5% or even 1% of a few areas. But even then, you can beat yourself up about not being the best--because even if you sometimes are the best at something, <i>sometimes</i> you aren&#x27;t. You can always make yourself miserable, if you choose to.<p>So what do you do? You have 3 choices:<p>1. sit there and complain about it<p>2. Deny the reality of your &quot;behindness&quot;, which makes for weak men and women (and I didn&#x27;t raise wimps)<p>3. Or, you can realize that there&#x27;s a set of skills related to managing your internal state<p>The best way to do this is to focus on process-oriented goals, rather than results oriented goals. In other words, take pride <i>in your work</i> not in the output. You can lose every game, yet feel okay, if you set your goals to be play a bit better than last time--and do it.<p>Once you get there, you can admit others are better than you and be thankful for the opportunity to learn from them--since you&#x27;re no longer competing.<p>This is what is meant by &quot;losers focus on the winners, and winners focus on themselves&quot;.<p>It&#x27;s simple, but not easy. It takes work to achieve this, just like it takes work to achieve any useful skill. And just like any other skill, you&#x27;ll get this right sometimes and screw it up at others. Just try to do it better today than you did yesterday, yes, like it&#x27;s any other skill.<p>Good luck, I&#x27;ll always be rooting for you.