[HamburgerEmoji]

I feel much the same way. I do some difficult stuff, but the stuff done by some other people is simply much more impressive. But I feel as if I've learned to be happy in humility. Why? Because the activities of multiple people are much harder to separate than it might initially seem. The person who does impressive work in some domain may only be able to focus to that extent because their home is being tidied by someone else, and their clothes washed by someone else, and their meals prepared by someone else, and so on. A lot of people think of those types of jobs as lowly, but how can they be lowly if they were key ingredients of the work we regard as more important? Do you see what I mean about difficulty of neatly separating the efforts?

I've done seemingly millions of projects. Sometimes I'm actually writing programs that most other people couldn't make. But lots of the time I'm not doing anything that requires smarts, but simply putting my heart in it and helping things get done, whatever those things are. If the dishes need washed, I do that. If the floor needs sweeping, I do that. If somebody has a question, I try to answer. I try to be encouraging. Meanwhile, the work I might regard as the real work is being done by people who have skills I lack. But I am doing what I can. I am finding where I can fit in and be useful. I am finding suitable roles in a vast interconnected system.

Most of the time it seems more likely that we'll be von Neumann's butler than von Neumann. This is OK. Just do what you can. Be kind, be helpful. Try never to be a drag on any project that's worthwhile. It's about the combined efforts of many, not individual heroes.