The Art of Being Ordinary

“The Girl in the Back Row”

Elena Moore had never won an award in her life.

Not for academics. Not for sports. Not for kindness or creativity or even punctuality. She had no gold stars in kindergarten, no “most likely to succeed” in middle school, and certainly no scholarships lined up when she graduated high school with a GPA that was somewhere between "okay" and "at least you passed."

At twenty-six, she worked at a small local print shop in the suburbs, spent her evenings watching reruns of sitcoms she already knew the endings to, and occasionally tried new hobbies only to drop them a few weeks later when they didn’t quite “click.” Her closet was a graveyard of impulsively bought knitting yarn, watercolor sets, and unused yoga mats.

It wasn’t that she didn’t try. She did. Elena tried so hard to be good at something—anything—that it made her feel tired all the time. It was like the whole world had been assigned a role and she’d just… missed the audition.

Everyone around her seemed to have something. Her childhood best friend, Mia, was already a published author. Her younger brother was a robotics engineer with a YouTube channel that had 800,000 subscribers. Even her co-worker, Stanley, an otherwise quiet man who smelled like toner, was a competitive bird-watcher who once got featured in a niche magazine called Feathered Friends.

Elena? She was just… Elena.

Average. Mild. Okay.

And that hurt more than she could admit.

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“The Curse of Potential”

Growing up, teachers had always called her “a bright girl with potential.”

“Potential” was a terrible word. It held all the weight of what could be without guaranteeing that anything would.

It was like someone handing her a beautifully wrapped gift box, only to find it empty inside.

At her worst, Elena would scroll through social media and watch strangers do things she couldn’t: sing like sirens, paint like magic, dance like the world would stop spinning just to watch them twirl. People with passions. People with talent. People with dreams so loud they didn’t even need to shout.

She once tried to write a novel too. Got five pages in, then stared at the blinking cursor until she cried and deleted everything.

She wasn’t bad. But she wasn’t good either.

And in today’s world, if you weren’t good, were you even there?

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“A Very Quiet Breakdown”

It happened on a Tuesday.

It wasn’t a dramatic day—no thunderstorm, no betrayal, not even a bad coffee. Elena was just stacking papers behind the register when her manager, Linda, called out:

“Elena, you’ve got a real knack for organizing the custom order files! They’re always so easy to find when you do it.”

Something about that made Elena want to cry.

She smiled, nodded, and excused herself to the restroom where she locked the door, sat on the toilet lid, and let the tears fall.

Not because Linda had said something wrong.

Because that was it. That was her compliment. That was her “thing.”

She was… good at organizing custom order files.

She sat in the bathroom for ten minutes, letting herself feel it—this quiet grief of being so painfully ordinary. Then she wiped her eyes, fixed her face, and went back to work.

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“ Not the Star, But Still in the Play”

Later that week, she went to a poetry open mic night with Mia. Elena didn’t write poetry, but she liked the way it sounded. She liked the words, the cadences, the emotion.

Mia read a piece that made half the audience hold their breath.

Afterward, Elena clapped like everyone else. But there was something else too—she felt proud. Not envious. Just… warm. Genuinely happy to witness it.

On the ride home, Mia said, “You always know when I’m nervous. Even before I realize it myself.”

Elena blinked. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Mia said. “You’re kind of like… emotional sonar. You notice people.”

Elena thought about that. She hadn’t seen it as a skill. But maybe it was.

Maybe she wasn’t a spotlight person. Maybe she was the kind of person who held the lights steady so someone else could shine.

And maybe that counted for something.

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“The Club of the Unremarkables”

One particularly lonely night, Elena joined a forum online called “The Club of the Unremarkables.” It was a space for people who felt ordinary. Who didn’t have a “thing.” The members shared stories, posted memes, and talked about how it felt to watch the world move around you like you were a background character.

One post stuck with her. It read:

“You don’t have to be the best at anything to have a meaningful life. You just have to be. Existing kindly is its own kind of art.”

Elena saved it to her phone.

She read it whenever the mediocrity began to sting.

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“The Birthday Plant”

On her 27th birthday, Elena didn’t throw a party. She didn’t have many friends, and the ones she had were scattered across cities and time zones. But her neighbor, an elderly woman named Mrs. Chen, knocked on her door with a small potted plant.

“It’s a peace lily,” Mrs. Chen said. “You seem like someone who’d take good care of it.”

Elena almost said, “But I’m not good at taking care of things.”

Instead, she said thank you.

Weeks passed. The lily thrived.

She watered it every Sunday. Cleaned its leaves. Talked to it when she didn’t feel like talking to anyone else.

It wasn’t a big thing.

But it was something.

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“The Piano at the Train Station”

On her way to work one morning, Elena passed the old upright piano at the train station. Usually, someone was playing it. This time, it sat alone, sunlight hitting the keys.

She sat down.

Her fingers didn’t know masterpieces. Just the clumsy chords her mom taught her as a child.

C. F. G. C again.

Simple. But soft. Familiar.

Someone paused nearby to listen. A man with a paper bag and tired eyes. He didn’t say anything, but when she stopped playing, he smiled and nodded before walking away.

She didn’t post it online.

She didn’t record it.

But something in her chest felt a little fuller that day.

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“The Art of Enough”

Months passed.

Elena still wasn’t extraordinary. She still didn’t paint like Mia or code like her brother or birdwatch like Stanley.

But she started to accept that maybe she didn’t have to.

She began noticing the beauty of being quietly reliable. Of being the person who remembers birthdays. Who sends thank-you notes. Who helps a lost child find their parent at the grocery store.

She started reading books just because she liked the covers. Cooking meals that didn’t look like Pinterest photos but tasted just fine. Volunteering at the library’s Saturday story time—not as the storyteller, but as the one who set out the chairs.

She smiled more.

Cried less.

Started to feel real.

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“A Letter to Herself”

On a rainy afternoon, Elena sat down with a blank notebook. She wrote:

“Dear me,

It’s okay that you’re not special in the way the world defines it. You are not a star, but you are a constellation of gentle acts. A laugh at the right time. A warm meal. A hand on a shoulder. That counts.

You count.

Love, Me.”

She closed the notebook.

Made tea.

And let the rain fall.

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“Ordinary, and That’s Okay”

By the time Elena turned 30, she had done a lot of things that wouldn’t show up in any biography.

She taught a kid how to tie their shoes.

She mailed a card to someone grieving.

She hosted a movie night where no one had to perform, or be brilliant, or have answers.

She laughed at herself.

She forgave herself.

She accepted herself.

Not as someone great.

But as someone good.

And sometimes, that’s even better.