It’s hard for others, too

We often assume that something that’s hard for us is easy for others (especially for others who seem to have their act together).

First, it (whatever it is) probably is hard for someone else. Second, people who are able to do it either a) find other things hard, b) still find it hard but have tricks to manage it, or c) have a lot more emotional bandwidth than you do right now.

Second, I find that I very much need help/advice from others about things I struggle with, even if I could give advice to someone else for very similar topics that they might find useful – I just can’t give it to myself. For example: I can see potential problems and solutions in a manuscript as a senior author (e.g. the mentor-y role) far more easily than I can as a first author (e.g. content-generator). And yet I learn as much in both roles. We need each other – we do not have our acts together in a vacuum.

Third, sometimes the most valuable mentors are peers or people just a little ahead of you in your chosen path. People too far along the path may forget the specific things they had to learn or have blocked out how painful certain particularly uncertain and stressful career stages (life stages) are.