I look around at the "successful" professionals in my field and in other professions and I just can't help but think that even if that person makes significantly more than me, I would never want to actually be them, I just want the money. Their lives are boring as shit. They can't talk about anything except their job because they've sunk so much time into their career to get where they are that it's essentially all they know or can talk about. They act like anyone honestly gives a damn about what their job entails or how difficult it is and think that people are impressed. In my opinion, the only thing anyone is impressed by is the paycheck. 

What does getting there involve? In my profession and most white collar jobs, it involves countless hours sitting in front of a computer and resisting the urge to shoot yourself right then and there. It involves lots of fake smiles and laughs and lots of pretending that you actually give a single fuck about the intrinsic value of your work if you can manage to find any at all. It involves counting down the days until you can retire after having sacrificed a large part of your youth doing things that will have no effect on the world whatsoever and that no one will remember in less than a decade at most. And there is very much a non-zero chance that you will never actually make it to retirement due to health ailments of some kind that you have no control over which will steal your retirement from you because this is America and America gives no fucks. 

Unless you become "rich" as in worth multiple millions, your statistically mediocre life will consist of spending the vast majority of the years granted to you doing things you would rather not be doing, focusing on things you don't care about, and getting paid just enough to be somewhat comfortable but never enough to actually escape. Statistically you never will. And if you're paid anything approaching minimum wage, you NEVER will. You'll fill your free time with mindless distractions to pretend that you aren't essentially trapped in an economic cage with a countdown timer and tell yourself that there's still hope. Maybe you entertain delusions of grandeur, thinking about what you would do if you were rich and famous. It's still possible you tell yourself. There's still time. 

But is there? Sometimes I point a loaded pistol to my temple to practice controlling the instinctual fear that accompanies the act. I do this because at some point it's time to tell yourself that maybe you gave it your best shot, but it's just not going to happen for you. The part of your life promised to you by everyone who told that it's going to get better is never going to come and it really was all just a lie you told yourself and maybe even really believed for awhile. And I need to know that when that time comes I'll be able to pick up the gun one last time without fear stopping me and finally quit the game.