When Gilmore Girls first aired, Rory Gilmore (Alexis Bledel) was the rare teenage girl character who always had her nose in a book and was super close with her mom, Lorelai (Lauren Graham). It’s safe to say that most who watched the original series imagined that after Rory’s graduation from Yale, her arc would only continue its upward trajectory. So it came as a surprise when, in 2016’s Gilmore Girls revival A Year In the Life, the young Ms. Gilmore hadn’t exactly become a raging success; instead, she was a portrait of a faltering millennial. But if you look closer, the original series holds clues as to what went wrong for Rory. Here’s our Take on what Rory’s failures teach us about the importance of forging your own path and taking responsibility for your mistakes early on.