Enjoying this piece a lot.

"It’s no wonder that for many of us “the story of our lives becomes the story of the lives we were prevented from living.”"

I've known many who convince themselves that any failure in life was not of their own doing, but their bad cards https://twitter.com/neil_chilson/status/1341048076664975360

But it is interesting to think that the pressure to live one's best life is so new. I wonder if these people would have narrated their stores in the same way.

I know people with every blessing and turn of luck who tell themselves this. Meanwhile I know others who believe me doing well in life is because of my good fortune. And in a sense it is, but not because of ease. But because growing up with a bipolar mother who I long believed...

hated me, because her actions suggested as much, made me quiet, observant, and a good listener. Then a flock of debilitation autoimmune conditions forced me to overcome that if I wanted to persevere. I had to be my own best advocate to doctors 4x my age who refused to listen.

And I had to confront my mother when I was 17 that I wouldn't take her mental games and emotional manipulation any longer. We're very close now, because that prompted her to seek treatment, seriously that time, realizing she would lose me if she didn't.

So while I was dealt the right cards, it's not in the way many think. And it's something I think about a lot. Just the way we narrate the truth out of our lives to give ourselves the best version of why we did and didn't do.

I see people tell themselves these stories all the time, omitting facts and romanticizing. Every now and then an article gets to the heart of my thoughts and curiosities on it, and this New Yorker piece hit home. In particular because while I know the thinking is common,

there is very little in my life I regret and I never wish for alternate lives that could have been. But I think I may be the exception, and it's nice to read something to help me understand the rule.