People don’t trust the mountaintop view if you don’t show them the rocky trail you climbed to get there. Success without context feels sterile—unattainable and unrelatable. By leading with struggle, you remind others that failure isn’t a dead end; it’s a detour. And let’s be real: nobody bonds over perfection. Vulnerability isn’t just good storytelling—it’s a strategy. It creates trust, makes success feel replicable, and silences the voice in their head that says, “I can’t.” “Identifying with kids is only one of the many relationship challenges. Let’s consider another: identifying with somebody who hasn’t been as successful as you. First of all, you’ve got to talk about your struggle, not your success. If you have an hour to talk, and you spend fifty-nine minutes on your success story, you are building a gulf, not a bridge. You have to spend most of your time on your struggle. Talk about your fears, your apprehensions, the times you hesitated, the times you were about to give it all up. Once you’ve created that identification and built that bridge, you can then take people by the hand and then show them your success. It will have special meaning because it came from a struggle. It came from determination and heartbreak. You may even have come from the same place as the person you’re talking to. That kind of identification makes you real. It makes your success seem possible to others. It provides inspiration.” Leading an Inspired Life Jim Rohn