“Worry is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do but never gets you anywhere”
– Erma Bombeck
I once heard a great joke about a Jewish mother who sends a telegram to her son. It reads, “Start worrying–details to follow.”
For the purposes of this entry, we’ll make it an Asian mother.
I don’t know if it’s a woman thing, an Asian thing or just a human thing, but we spend all of the time imagining the Worst Possible Scenario. But, what if everything is fine?
Who would I be without the story of imminent doom and prepping for everything to go to hell in a handbasket?
Who would I be if I wasn’t wringing my hands over the state of the world, doom-scrolling through the New York Times app, checking the falling stock market every five minutes? Who would I be if I just trusted that everything is going to be fine?
I had a 105-year-old friend named Dodo who passed away last year (“Rhea, I’m a fever!”) On her outgoing voicemail message, she said, “You’ve reached Dodo. Don’t leave a message. Everything is going to be OK.”
So, I figure Dodo has seen a few things and if she says it’s going to be OK, I’m inclined to believe her.
As we head into the latter part of 2021, I challenge you (and myself) to spend at least as much time imagining that everything is going to be great as imagining the Doomsday Scenario–that we could be wild successes as much as we could be dismal failures, that we could flourish as much as we could flail.
Let’s put those big, beautiful brains of ours to work imagining a glorious future instead of ruminating on Catastrophes A to Z.
