When leaving, he met an old man sitting on a stone bench in front of the hall. He looked at the crowd still lining up to ask for signatures and asked: "What do you see?" He replied: "I see everyone admiring successful people". He nodded: "Yes. But they only see the stage lights. Few people pay attention to the shadow behind". Seeing him bewildered, he slowly said: "The shadow of a successful person is always longer than their success".
That sentence reminded him of the time he asked a friend who was a doctor what was the most difficult thing in the profession. He thought he would hear stories about surgeries or medical records. But the friend just smiled: "It's many birthdays of children, birthdays of wives that still have to be in the hospital". He asked a female reporter what was the most memorable thing after decades of working. She didn't mention any awards, just said: "There are Tet holidays that have never had a full meal to reunite with family". Everyone sees their success. And the gaps behind are only known to relatives.
Young people often like to ask about the secrets to success. They want to know which books to read, which courses to take and how to manage time. Few people ask what to give up. In fact, every success has a price to pay. Some people pay with time, with youth. Some people pay with the sacrifice of personal hobbies, private pleasures, absent meals in the family and sometimes even when they don't have time to say goodbye to loved ones...
A human journey is like climbing a mountain, to reach the top you have to go through a winding road with no shortage of bushes and thorns, including misguided instructions. And many people have to give up halfway, unable to overcome themselves.
That afternoon, the sun was very harsh. The old man stood up and walked away, his shadow stretched across the road, longer than a human body. He suddenly understood why he said that. Under the sunlight, the shadow is always longer than its form. Under the aura, sacrifices are always greater than what others see. Therefore, before admiring a success, perhaps the more worthwhile thing to do is to pay a little respect to the silent shadow behind it. Because it is that shadow that contains the drops of sweat, the falls and even the things that never appear in a successful person surrounded by a crowd.
