You are playing the wrong game, and you are going to lose.
We’ve been duped and don’t even realize it.
There was a time when the conventional wisdom made a lot of sense, and it was in your best interest to follow the “rules”. Back in the day when everyone dreamed of the Leave it to Beaver style life, with the nuclear family, 2.5 kids, a house with a white picket fence, and a dog, it was important to follow the right path if you wanted to succeed.
You needed to do well in school so that you could get into a college. That’s because college is what you needed in order to get a good job. If you played your cards right, you could be a company man (that term did not age well), and provide for your family while working towards a great pension.
Many of our parents grew up that way, and so they believed that we needed to do the same in order to get that for ourselves and the families we would go on to build.
You didn’t get to follow a different path, because if you did, you were deemed rebellious, or ungrateful, and most importantly, our parents could brag about us to their friends.
And so it continued for a few generations. If you wanted to “win”, this was the path you followed. Or else!
