the fear of being average/ordinary

i am not sure that "fear" is the right word to describe this feeling, but it is the best i can think of at the moment. the feeling is simply a strong willingness not to blend into the crowd, not to be a person people meet and immediately forget.....you know.......not to be just like everyone else. i really don't know where this feeling came from or when it kind of became the driving force for my wanting to excel. if i had to take a guess, it would probably be from my involvement in sports from the time i could walk. either way, i learned how to compete at a very early age. i try imagining living life without this fierce nature, but i find it extremely hard. i cannot get past the notion of being "ok" with just doing enough to get by. where's the motivation to do anything then? that's about as far as i can get. it all breaks down after that. i play with this thought a lot, and i have had a number of conversations growing up with people telling me that i can't be the best at everything. my response as a youth was always "why not." i never got a "good" (satisfactory) answer to this question. it was always the "because" answer adults give when they don't know what to say or some variation of an adult trying to convince you by saying a bunch of nothing.

as brad pitt said in troy, "...that is why no one will remember your name"

p.s. - interesting article