who are your peers? - 憂鬱症

Famous and rich people can feel sad and awful enough to end themselves too.

Much of our psychological pain stems from feeling less than our peers,
resulting in shame, anger, and despair, because we 'should've' been able to
do as well as our peers.

Which begs the question, who do we consider as our peers?

Our relatives? Our schoolmates? Our colleagues, or fellow mental health
survivors? Is it a social tribe that we identify with?

Been reading Primates on Park Avenue, and it turns out life on the Upper East
Side is hella scary, and living inside the community forces the author to
adopt the currency that applies to this social tribe: immaculate physical
appearance and the ability to 'be on the in' with many sought after
opportunities.

There's this struggle with being authentic and move at one's own pace versus
being approved and respected by this community you live in.

If I could view myself as a different species than my parents or my classmates,
maybe there would be less self-loathing.

What is a reasonable standard that is achievable but also inspires, tailored
especially for me? If we have to compare to gauge our progress, what is the
bar?

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