I was recently in the audience of a middle school graduation. This was a serious celebration, with balloons, awards, and the works. The speech from the school's principal was delivered with the intent to inspire. The principal looked back at the students with utmost encouragement and said, "With the right amount of effort, you can do anything you put your mind to! The sky is not the limit!" The sentiment was received with a gracious roar of applause and an abundance of warmhearted smiles.

At my core, I'm a sucker for generalized encouragement. Deep down, I want each and every single living organism to be able to recognize all of their strengths to their full potential all the time, always. I swoon at this, and (egotistically) I think it's a beautiful concept.

At the same time, I think it can have adverse effects. My gut reaction to this speech was, "Oh, yikes."

I equate the, "you can do anything!" ideology to the bootstrapping model. This is idea is that a person is their own self-starter and can generate wealth from virtually nothing, that a person can pull themselves up from their bootstraps. At face value, it's super motivational! It inspires the individual toward taking responsibility for achieving their goals. It's a linear thought to follow, which is nice and cathartic on the brain; "If I put in X amount of effort, I will be rewarded with Y". It's pretty solid.

However, it's problematic. There will be situations within a person's life where they will be confronted with discouragement. A person will put all of their energy into achieving a certain goal. They'll follow a specific formula, they'll work endlessly, and put in the "right amount of effort". They'll have it down to a near-perfect science. However, even in the case of a flawless work ethic, we are still constantly subject to reality.

Sociologically, we are rattled by systems that oppress persons based identities such as: race, gender, class, ability, sexuality, and citizenship status (only to name a few). Trying to inspire more "bootstrappers" further perpetuates the idea that an individual is responsible for navigating a system they were never meant to benefit from.

As explained by a Toby Morris comic for The Wireless:

"...People often forget or don't realize that our starting points, or our paths to success, aren't all even. Some people have to overcome more obstacles in the path to succeeding than others."

Individually, we're just humans. Outlining success and achievement as formulaic would be justifiable if we were coin-operated machines. We screw up sometimes (read also: a lot). We need rest. We need to slow down. We need to break down.

This is not to say that effort is erroneous. This is to say that effort directed solely toward measurable achievement is not synonymous with living a full, complex life. Sometimes, the sky is the limit. We will struggle with experiences outside of our control, and that's okay (really). Telling our youth that their hard work will get them what they want is not necessarily untrue, but it does not employ the whole story.

Here is the advice I would give if I were allowed to give a speech at an 8th grade graduation (note: I will probably never be allowed to do this):

Work hard and take care of yourself. Be a mess sometimes, you'll get yourself back together. You won't get yourself back together on your own, though. Care for the people around you, and let them care for you. Keep setting outlandish goals for yourself and keep them in sight. Reaching typical success may be limited, but there are unlimited definitions of what success looks like. You'll mess up, and you'll grow from it. Ultimately, your goal here is to have a dynamic, messy, and beautiful life. With the right amount of effort and the right amount of rest, you'll get what you need, and it'll be enough.