The Formula Worked. So Why Does It Feel Like This?
A thought I keep coming back to, no matter how many times I try to leave it alone. I have spent a good portion of my adult life doing what you're supposed to do. International education. Graduate degree. Multilateral experience. Consulting roles across multiple countries. The kind of CV that, on paper, looks like a person who has it together. And in many ways - measurable ways - I do. I have worked hard. I have earned things. I am genuinely proud of some of it. But I keep coming back to the same uncomfortable thought, the one that shows up quietly at the end of a long workday or in the middle of a conversation I'm only half present for: Did I choose this? Or did I just follow the formula? The Formula Is Real. That's the Problem. Here's something nobody really says out loud: for a certain subset of people, professional success isn't that remarkable. I don't mean that cruelly. I mean it honestly. If you were raised in a stable, present, caring family - the kind wh...