Day 193: Does Reality Bite? Or, Do We Just Think It Does?

Throughout my life I have found one thing to be constant, that is that most of us tend to think things in our lives really are worse than they actually are. And, life being life, it always has a way of showing us reality. We see that things could either be worse, because something really bad happens; or, it somehow shows us that what we have really isn't that bad, and we should be grateful for the smallness of our problems.

I am going to admit here publicly that I have often thrown myself pity parties in my own head; dramatizing how horrible things are, and making a mountain out of a mole hill (oh yeah, another tired cliche). It is scary how f*cked up we (or, maybe it's just me) can make things seem in our own heads when they really aren't. 

And, as I am reflecting on this, it keeps pointing me back to that other tired cliche I keep writing about on this blog: our days are short. That means we shouldn't waste what time we have by creating problems in our heads that are not really there. Reality provides enough real ones for us to navigate. 

And, I think that at age 50 I am finally starting to get this (what can I say, I am a slow learner). As I wrote here a couple of weeks ago, bad things happen in life, that is just life. Some of these we can control, and some we cannot. 

"The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem."~Theodore Issac Rubin

 
But, the only thing we can control is how we react to them. They can either make us stronger, or, they can knock us down.