In praise of being ordinary

I’ve grown up through a time where teachers and parents and management consultants have glorified ‘excellence’. I have been encouraged to “aspire to greatness”, to be a winner, to be a leader. Year after year I heard the mantras that anyone can grow up to be Prime Minister, that  here is only one place to be, and that’s in the seat of number one. Don’t be a loser,  I was warned. I tried to follow this well-meant advice, but it never quited worked in my mind, the mantle of greatness never fit my shoulders, I felt a bit like the emperor with no clothes.

After 70 years of listening to such nonsense, I have finally reached plain ground of comfortable normality - not on the peak of genius, not in a hole of failure. I can happily look at my image in the mirror in the morning and say to myself “phew; you’re ordinary.”