The struggle for approval. A process of conditioning that began so long ago. You yearned for a gold star, a wink, a jellybean. It made you sit a little straighter, colour a little faster, throw a little harder. Those gold stars, those winks, those jellybeans; they were blocks of lego building your self-esteem, tangible proof that you were great and becoming greater every single day.
And then people start to pull you apart. Sometimes it's block by block, so you barely notice. Other times it's a situation rivaling that of the 2004 tsunami. Jellybeans become more infrequent, and you find yourself looking down at a handful of the horrid black ones. So throw them in the trash (or, if you're Mrs Tham, make your children throw the jellybeans the doctor gave you down the toilet because they're kept in an unsanitary environment) and start fresh. Let the panic-stricken fear drive thoughts into ideas, ideas into designs and designs into internationally-reknowned pieces of magic.
Yes, it can be done. Maybe not today, but there's always tomorrow.
