You are agreeing with the article.

>"found that optimal satisfaction came from setting the bar above average, but not excessively so. When agents were overambitious, meaning their threshold was far above the mean reward, they fared worse on average than agents that were underambitious by the same margin. In short, being too hard to please was worse than being too easy to please."

The argument is that maximal output is not attained through permanent maximal effort. Maximal output is achieved via the correct level of effort. (less than maximum effort).

Take sports: If you're so ambitious that you refuse to take rest days, and even so ambitious that you refuse to rest between sets, you're doing it wrong. You're more likely to reach your goal by resting and going slower.

The same is true in academics. If you are so ambitious in your goals that you take a course load beyond what you are actually capable of handling, your grades will suffer. You're more likely to get A's if you take fewer credits. Sure, you might be able to handle an 18 credit semester, but for someone who needs the extra study time, taking 6 courses instead of 5 will ultimately lower their scores.

School is a bit unique in that students are not competing with only their classmates, but for college admissions they are competing with virtually everyone else graduating that year. So students have no idea what the average will be. You can be the best graduating student of your class and still get rejected from colleges, because there are other students who are coming from other high schools with a better academic reputation, have better extra-curricular activities, or have better connections.