Reached for: Achievement
“I have to be the best; anything less and the old verdict that I'm not worth much just gets confirmed.”
It runs as a frantic climb, an accomplishment-mad drive to reach the top and be the best, pursued to bolster a self-worth that a negating family granted only grudgingly, and only for the near-impossible. Each summit steadies the worth for a moment and never for good. What it asks for is a worth that does not have to be re-earned at altitude every time.
Ivan Ilyich, who climbed the ranks and furnished the correct life to the last cushion, and found on his deathbed that none of it had been his own. The form implies a task: to find the worth before the climb, not at the top of it.
What is the "Reached for: Achievement" pattern?
It runs as a frantic climb, an accomplishment-mad drive to reach the top and be the best, pursued to bolster a self-worth that a negating family granted only grudgingly, and only for the near-impossible. Each summit steadies the worth for a moment and never for good. What it asks for is a worth that does not have to be re-earned at altitude every time.
What does "Reached for: Achievement" sound like when it shows up?
I have to be the best; anything less and the old verdict that I'm not worth much just gets confirmed.
What is the archetypal form of "Reached for: Achievement"?
Ivan Ilyich, who climbed the ranks and furnished the correct life to the last cushion, and found on his deathbed that none of it had been his own. The form implies a task: to find the worth before the climb, not at the top of it.
want to see your own?
create your cipherspace — free.want to work with it over time?
upgrade to the field.This is a pattern. Not a verdict.
It appears in many lives.