Stop Bragging About the Mud

Have you ever heard “I got it out the mud” as a way to describe being successful?  It means nobody handed you anything, you struggled, you figured it out, you worked with what you had, survived circumstances that you shouldn’t have and yet somehow you made something of yourself.  It brings about pride in that, and don’t get me wrong, there should be, but I recently came across a video of a young man was making a point that I did not expect to sit with as long as I did.

In the video, he said he was tired of people celebrating that they got it out the mud. Not because he lacks respect for people who overcame hardship, but because he was asking, “Why was there mud in the first place?” and “Why are we so proud of getting out of the mud that we forget to ask why the next generation is still standing in it?”

Now before you close this tab, hear me out. This is not a dismissive think piece on “pulling yourself up by the bootstraps.”  I am not saying “Our generation of parents failed, and we owe them nothing.”  I am also not saying, “Our parents sacrificed, so we owe them whatever they need for the rest of their lives, even if it impacts our own financial future.”

For the records, “the mud” is both personal and systemic. The mud is definitely real and we have to acknowledge what each generation before us was up against. Some of us still have living parents, grandparents and aunts that lived through barriers and obstacles that we have only read about. It’s kind of hard to think about a diverse investment portfolio when you’re trying to stay above water sifting through discrimination (racial and employment), redlining, segregation, limited access to education, credit, jobs that have a career ladder, and entire systems designed to keep certain people from accumulating property, finances, influence and any power whatsoever.

Some people didn’t start a business because stability, any stability, was an accomplishment.  Some parents worked, raised families, bought homes, kept food on the tables, and gave their children opportunities they never had, far beyond what their parents ever thought could happen.

Some people were born into poverty, racism, and discrimination.  Some into families without financial literacy, communities where survival is the only goal.  Some families did everything they knew to do and still couldn’t’ create wealth and all of the above and more deserves acknowledgment. The point of surviving the mud should be to make sure your children don’t have to start there too.

All of that matters. Their work and sacrifice matters, but acknowledging what someone survived does not mean we can never examine what happened next.

I think the deeper question is “When does honoring the people who sacrificed for you turn into sacrificing the future they supposedly sacrificed for?” and “Now that you know more, what are you going to do differently?”

A Dreamed Deferred…

It was probably the comments more than the actual video that made me pause and think.  The comments were filled with a variety of opinions, frustrations, and even gratitude about how either their parent didn’t do enough to parents who thought of everything and was intentional about making their child’s life better.

Some of the comments wanted to give the grandparent generation full grace, and honestly, that grace is warranted. That generation faced systemic obstacles that were not accidental. Policies, practices, and entire institutions were designed to limit what they could accumulate, what they could know, and what they could pass down. The mud for them was not a metaphor. It was engineered.

What happens when the person who is finally beginning ot “make it” becomes the retirement plan for everyone before them?

What happens when you ar ethe first person in your family with the degree, professional job, or what looks like a “good salary?” You have more earnings than your parents ever earned, and student loans, but you also have more expenses that they never had.

Then there’s the expectation of help with the house, car, debt, emergency, funeral, even problems that could have been anticipated years earlier.  Of course, because you love your family, you help.

What happens to your future every time you have to go backward to repair what was never prepared for?

Gratitude and indebtedness are not the same thing…or are they?

Every generation has an information problem, but having access to information does not automatically produce wisdom.

That is not about blame. It is about honesty.

The young man made a point in the video that landed harder than the comments gave him credit for. He said children should not have to stop building their future to bury your past.

He was talking specifically about parents who reach the end of their lives without life insurance, without savings, without any financial infrastructure, and then leave that weight to children who were already starting from behind. Not out of cruelty. But the result is the same regardless of intent. The child who just started to gain ground has to redirect every resource they have toward a loss they did not create.

I say, we need to acknowledge the systems that put the mud there in the first place, but then build a road.  To me, the evidence that you survived the mud may not be that everyone knows how hard you fought to get out, maybe it’s them people coming behind you that never have to stand their in the first place.

So maybe the next conversation for every generation is what did you inherit, what did you survive, what did you learn and what are you determined not to pass down?