Jury Duty.

Agitating, required, and painstakingly annoying to get out of. The job of a juror is to judge. In today’s society, where we are connected at every moment of every day, analyzed through social platform after social platform, when do we stop letting the jury influence the way we celebrate? 

Being a juror is an ordinary citizen's chance to hold a position of sanctimony. You are put in a place where your judgment is power. 

The job of the juror has moved from something that we are rarely and randomly selected to do to a full-time job because of social media, and since we are always on social media, the way that we react to success is now determined by the reaction we perceive the jury will have on all our socials, which will rule on our case. 

We've all become jurors. Except instead of being randomly selected once every few years to decide someone's fate in a courthouse, we're on duty 24/7, rendering verdicts on every post, every story, every humble-brag and not-so-humble flaunt that crosses our feeds. We judge whether success looks authentic or performative, effortless or desperate, earned or lucky.

Why is it that ambition and undeniable success have become things that you are supposed to tone down or never mention? Is it because we don’t want to make the jury around us seem like we are trying? Has putting your everything into something become a vulnerability, a weakness, even to the juror's eye? 

If so, I call complete and total bullshit. 

Ambition is no longer cause for celebration. 

Now, we see people wake up with a 6-figure follower count, and success seems seamless. No years of grind. No blood, sweat, and tears – or so it seems. 

Here's what the jury sees: Someone wakes up with 100K followers. An influencer posts a "get ready with me" and ends up with a closet full of Birkins and a brand deal with Dior. A 23-year-old sells a startup you've never heard of for eight figures. A friend gets promoted and posts about it as if it's a casual Tuesday, no big deal, just what seems to be the usual day-to-day. 

It is rare, almost unheard of, for true success to be an overnight story from algorithmic luck – despite that fact, success is downplayed and made to seem seamless even when the work is overwhelming.

What the jury doesn't see: The five years of posting to seventeen followers before the algorithm blessed them. The creator who pitched 200 brands before one said yes. The 23-year-old who slept four hours a night for three years and mortgaged their mental health to build that company. Your friend who applied for that promotion three times and rewrote their portfolio seven.

Social media has perfected the highlight reel without the bloopers. We see the champagne pop, never the grueling grind that earned it. We see the finish line, never the unglamorous middle miles when your lungs are burning and you're questioning every life choice that led you here.

And here's the thing: this isn't anyone's fault. It's not that influencers or entrepreneurs or your successful friends are lying. It's that the platform itself rewards the performance of effortlessness. A post about "I can't believe this happened!" performs better than "I worked my ass off for this and it finally paid off." The algorithm favors casual miracles over earned victories.

So we've all learned to play the game. We downplay. We add self-deprecating humor. We say "somehow" and "randomly" and "so grateful" instead of "I earned this" and "I worked for this" and "I'm proud of myself."

The jury wants effortlessness even when we have been pushed to our very end. 

In this case, I say their verdict is very wrong.

The jury has decided: If it looks like you're trying, you've already lost.

Thankfully, your life does not have to be lived on trial. In your life, you are the judge, jury, and executioner, and no one has the power to overthrow your dictatorship. 

Ambition has become something we're supposed to hide. Not the ambition itself—everyone still wants success, recognition, achievement—but the visible ambition. The kind where people can see you working for it. The kind where your effort shows.

Putting everything into something used to be admirable. Now it reads as vulnerability, as weakness, as proof that you're not naturally talented enough for success to just... happen to you.

Success is rarely ever something slow, so don’t be fooled.

All I see and hear now is expectation with no follow-through, when in reality, all you can do is throw all your darts at the board and pray that one sticks. Success should never be an expectation, and it is never a guarantee. 

Success doesn’t have to be a golden trophy at the end of the road. More times than not, you will give something your all and fail, and fail, and just when you think you’ve caught a break, you will fail again. Success, then, isn’t the end achievement; it’s the journey. If you have the fortitude to give something your all, fail, and then try again with twice the amount of effort, that right there is a fucking win. 

Give it your all. Let it show. Fail and fail again and keep trying anyway.

And when something works out—when you get the win, land the opportunity, reach the milestone—don't you dare diminish it. Don't translate your pride into casual indifference for an audience of jurors who don't have to live your life.

Be the person who posts "Six months of preparation, and I'm beyond grateful" without deleting the first part.

Be the person who celebrates the journey, not just the destination.

Be the person who rejects the jury's verdict that effort equals inadequacy.

Your success will not look like the person next to you, and that's exactly as it should be. Their highlight reel isn't your measuring stick. Their performance of effortlessness isn't your reality.

The trial is over. You're acquitted.

Now go celebrate yourself like you mean it.

Kisses,

Nicky Reich