Today, I came to the quiet realization that we may never meet again.
I recently learned that your year-end bonus amounts to the equivalent of twenty months’ salary. I am genuinely happy for you.
The last time we met was last year, when I left my job. Since then, our lives seem to have moved in very different directions.
Perhaps, if I am honest, there is a trace of jealousy in me. You come from a family that is able to provide you with things I have never had—financial security, opportunities to travel, and even guidance on the subtle social rules of professional life, such as preparing gifts for superiors.
I cannot say the same for myself.
My mother told me that earning money has become more difficult than before. Although she is already retired, she still tries to save money for my brother and me. Hearing this filled me with a deep sense of sorrow.
My aunt has worked tirelessly her entire life, and even after retirement, she continued working. Yet she was diagnosed with breast cancer and is still undergoing chemotherapy.
At some point, I had to accept a simple truth: we are different. Our encounter was merely coincidental, and we come from entirely different backgrounds.
If I continue to measure myself against you, I will only deepen my own unhappiness.
I should not fix my gaze on your life. Instead, I need to turn inward and focus on my own path.
My only true competitor is myself. While many people cross the river by boat, I must swim—searching, patiently, for a small boat that belongs to me alone.
Perhaps I will never own a yacht. Perhaps I may never reach the harbor I once imagined.
But still, I am in the water—and I am moving forward.