In other words: being hated, ignored, and rejected as a consequence of a shattered reputation, is an opportunity to free ourselves from the burden of validation-seeking.
And it made me sad - because I've given my father bad press over the years - that I couldn't speak to him now and ask him about these feelings and what it was and what he'd experienced.
I'm not saying that stuff isn't hard, of course it is, but writing has its own codes of discipline and honor, and all those victimhood stories are what's giving memoirs a bad name.
And what you do see around people that have got that way and got to the top without being trustworthy and without being cooperative, you see this bad reputation around them.