I feel that sometimes you see in life that everything is going well for a good long time and then everything falls apart. You can see this with Joan of Arc who had astounding success --for a while. A 17 year old girl declared war on the one of the powerful Empires in the world and won. She said she would raise raise the seige of Orleans--and did so. She said she would have Charles VII crowned King in Reims and led him through enemy territory and had him crowned King of all France. And then she was captured and burnt at the stake. But somehow even in her fall there was something astounding. The trial was recorded almost word for word. Without that all there would be today would be an unconfirmed legend. That brings me to the issue of trust in God. Sometimes, a person thinks everything is going his way because he trusts in God, and is serving him sincerely. However, trust is just a feeling. One minute one might have it, and the next minute it might be gone, and is replaced with him thinking he accomplished something on his own. There can be a element of self deception in this. Furthermore, there is a famous argument between the Chovot Levavot and the Ramban if one should trust in God while doing effort, or one should trust in God with no effort.