I do not deserve this award,
but I have arthritis, and I don’t deserve that either.
Jack Benny
We often complain ‘it’s not fair!’ when we are victims of injustice, but how often when we are the ones coming out on top?
Sometimes we do work hard for things and earn them, but more often we just have things happen to us and somehow feel we deserve the good ones and not the bad.
I’m not advocating some kind of fatalism where we never strive for anything, just suggesting that whenever you hear, or say, the word ‘deserve’ you think about what it means, and whether or not it is relevant for what you are trying to communicate.