Borrowed wins

The promotion comes through. The team hits the target and your name's on the email. The truck you drive is the newest in the yard, the section you run posts the best numbers this quarter. Something in you straightens up and quietly thinks: this is who I am now. It feels like winning. Notice how much of it you actually did.

Epictetus, once a slave and never fooled by status, cut straight to it: "Be not elated at any excellence not your own" (Enchiridion 6, Carter). He used a horse for the joke. A horse that boasted "I am beautiful" might be forgiven — but a man who says "I have a beautiful horse" is preening over the horse's merit, not his own. Swap in your version. A strong quarter the market handed you. A title someone chose to grant. A tool, a territory, a lucky account. Real, and worth having. Just not you.

Yesterday you named the two scoreboards. Today, watch which one your pride hooks onto. The win you can stand on is the one you'd still own if the title, the tool, and the good month all vanished tomorrow — the care you brought, the corners you didn't cut.

Take the promotion. Just don't mistake the badge for the work that earned it.