We feel pressured to do something extraordinary with our lives, or to an extraordinary standard of merit, or in a way that's applauded by an extraord… - Oliver Burkeman

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We feel pressured to do something extraordinary with our lives, or to an extraordinary standard of merit, or in a way that's applauded by an extraordinary number of people – even though it's true by definition that only a few people can ever be extraordinary in any given domain. (If we could all stand out from the crowd, there'd be no crowd from which to stand out.) Why shouldn't an anonymous career spent quietly helping a few people get to qualify as a meaningful way to spend one's time? Why shouldn't an absorbing conversation, an act of kindness, or an exhilarating hike get to count? Why adopt a definition that rules such things out?

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About Oliver Burkeman

Oliver Burkeman (born 1975) is a British journalist (principally for the British newspaper The Guardian) and writer.

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Additional quotes by Oliver Burkeman

Ceaseless optimism about the future only makes for a greater shock when things go wrong; by fighting to maintain only positive beliefs about the future, the positive thinker ends up being less prepared, and more acutely distressed, when things eventually happen that he can't persuade himself to believe are good. (And such things will happen.)

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we do not try to forcefully detach ourselves from the feelings, thoughts and expectations that arise in our mind. We don't try to force anything into or out of the mind. Rather, we let things rise and fall, come and go, and simply be … there will be times in meditation when we're relaxed, and times when our minds are agitated.

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