I suspect that many of us are less afraid of failure than of discovering that our lives will be ordinary.
Failure at least leaves room for a dramatic explanation. We could have succeeded. Circumstances intervened. We were unlucky, misunderstood or insufficiently prepared.
Ordinariness offers no such consolation. It suggests that a life can be decent, intelligent and even happy without becoming remarkable.
And yet we continue to measure ourselves against imaginary versions of who we might have been.
I sometimes wonder whether the pursuit of an exceptional life prevents us from noticing the life we are already living.