A great number of people believe they can when they can’t, the reverse is less frequent. Which is likely the outgrowth of saying to anyone “you can do it” being much easier and safer than a more realistic assessment.
Instead I like to say “that will be a lot of work” which is generally true, can help someone succeed by focusing on something productive, and even failure at the given goal often results in something positive. Hard work simply pays better dividends than dreaming about what comes after success.
Very true. Many comments in this overall post arrive at the nuanced stance that it's the effort that is key to focus on and relate. Everything else there is no way to connect to causality.
I want to add that "belief" in yourself, though as you say is rather a biased pathway, is still to me so essential and valuable. Because it is the thing that in some socioeconomic circles is taken for granted and in others is completely assumed in the reverse. So from a humanist perspective I'd rather people fall short of their dream than to never even be able to dream at all.
I guess I am saying it is the lived experience that counts. If you are blissfully naive then is it a better life? iono maybe! but that's reminds me of beautiful animals. And the difference between humans and animals, so far as we come to believe, is that we can choose to suffer. and understand happiness and in that be so utterly unhappy. hah
Instead I like to say “that will be a lot of work” which is generally true, can help someone succeed by focusing on something productive, and even failure at the given goal often results in something positive. Hard work simply pays better dividends than dreaming about what comes after success.