I’ve heard my entire life that good things happen to good people. It seems like a standard metric: do good things, and good things will happen to you. Early on, school was the embodiment of this same concept: do well on a test, get a scented sticker. Participate in class, get a gold star. Work hard, get student of the week. It was a straightforward, linear system that was actualized in real life. It’s why, since then, I’ve tried to live my life with the utmost sincerity and respect—to reap the benefits that come along with these good actions.

It’s also why, when I was younger, I believed any injustices would set themselves right. My elementary school teacher grading my assignment wrong? I would speak up. My friend forcing me to play the evil dragon every time while she plays the princess? I would speak up. And God forbid, my mom telling me that my outfit was ugly? You best believe that I would speak up.

Yet as I grew older, I’ve realized that this philosophy is not entirely true. Though many people may have achieved success through pure work and grit, it’s also mind-numbingly common that someone can work their hardest, and, much to their dismay, still be surpassed by the easygoing genius. It’s like a lottery: life doling out arbitrary results regardless of effort.

We’ve been told for years that life simply isn’t fair. Sometimes, we don’t get all that we deserve—and other times, we get more than what we worked for. When we receive unexpectedly generous rewards, we don’t speak up—justice is served, we think. Plus, we reap the benefit: what’s the point? Yet, for some reason, when we suffer the brunt of the consequences, we automatically blame everyone but ourselves.

That raises the question…do we really deserve it, or were we just promised it?

Like the saying that good things happen to good people, people often promise us certain things. For instance: if you study hard, you will get a good grade. Or: if you exercise every day, you will lose weight soon. Or even: if I flirt with my situationship and text them every day, I will start dating them. We cannot begin to fathom a reality without what we are promised. And when we do not receive the benefits of what we were promised, we blame everyone but ourselves; after all, it’s what we were promised. “Life isn’t fair” transitions from a maxim to an excuse to find blame in anything, anyone.

The reality is that we oversimplify, leading to unavoidable entitlement. We believe that we are entitled to certain results just because we believe in the oversimplification that “good things happen to good people.” Unfortunately, the world does not quite work that way, and some results in life will always be subject to arbitrary luck over true skill or grit. It’s true that hard work often can lead to success, yet it is irrevocably false that hard work will always lead to success. The first step to change is to realize that life is indeed not fair, and that we may not always receive the benefits we deserve.

So, then what should we do? Should we give up—become the paradigm of a couch potato? If the world is indeed inherently unfair, what’s the point in trying?

Well, perhaps we have to live for more than just results alone. Though a final result may leave us disappointed, we can reap benefits in other ways as well. Along the journey of sleepless nights and teary eyes, we have unlocked a part of ourselves that we wouldn’t have discovered if the path was easy. We often see the final reward as the result of our hard work, yet we don’t realize that it’s the transformation along the way—the journey to reach that reward—that allows us to develop resilience, strength, and discipline. While trophies can chip, certificates can wear out, and stickers can peel off, it is our innate sense of self that stays with us our whole lives. In a world where the promised destination is uncertain, it is only the journey that we can always rely on. And in a world where we are not owed anything, it is our grit and our integrity that we keep with us for life.