What We Call Obstacles
How adversity clarifies agency, and why comfort so often erodes it
We like to believe that life presents itself in clean categories. Opportunities are to be seized. Obstacles are to be overcome or avoided. One is good; the other is bad. One signals progress; the other delay. It is a comforting fiction.
But comforting to whom? And at what cost?
In reality, the most consequential moments of a life do not arrive labelled. T…
