This passage from ‘The Art of Fielding’ really rang true for me.
Schwartz cherished these private, diligent hours. All day long, no matter how hard he worked, no matter what he accomplished, a voice in his head berated him for his laziness, his sloth, his inability to concentrate. His concerns were trivial. His knowledge of history was shallow. His Latin sucked, and his Greek was worse. How did he expect to grasp Aurelius and Epictetus, inquired the voice, when he could barely string to Latin words together? Only here, long after midnight, when everyone else was sleeping, when nothing was expected of him, could Schwartz convince himself that he was working hard enough. These hours felt stolen, added to his life. The voice fell quiet. Even the pain in his knees subsided. p. 102