Overthinking is my family’s trademark. Let’s take all these booksmarts and expensive educations and put them to work. Let’s make all the literary analysis for Beloved and Northanger Abbey finally pay off. Like an Agatha Christie mystery, everything you need is already right in front of you. If you think hard enough, you’ll be able to sort it all out and come to a conclusion- and not just any conclusion. The right conclusion. The truest one, the most trustworthy one, the one that will bring you the most happiness.
But that’s not the case, is it? Life doesn’t have a narrative arc, or a steady sprinkling of clues. We impose those afterwards, when we’re still trying to figure out why things happened the way they did, for better or for worse. In reality, things just happen. First one thing, then another and another, and as time passes the things pile up and you’ve got a life. I’ve stopped writing chronological descriptions of vacations and hikes in my scrapbook. The order of the small stuff doesn’t matter. What matters is it happened and all added up to a beautiful day in the woods. Thinking of that day in the woods leaves me with a warm feeling in my chest.
The feeling of things matter more than their logic. My most illogical moves have brought me the most happiness. This doesn’t mean it’s time for me to be reckless and blow my savings or quit my job. But it does mean it’s time for me to loosen the grip a little bit. Start chasing feelings instead of tidy narratives- Lord knows I couldn’t will those into existence if I tried (and I’ve tried). My English professors would call this a paradigm shift. Let’s hope it sticks.
But that’s not the case, is it? Life doesn’t have a narrative arc, or a steady sprinkling of clues. We impose those afterwards, when we’re still trying to figure out why things happened the way they did, for better or for worse. In reality, things just happen. First one thing, then another and another, and as time passes the things pile up and you’ve got a life. I’ve stopped writing chronological descriptions of vacations and hikes in my scrapbook. The order of the small stuff doesn’t matter. What matters is it happened and all added up to a beautiful day in the woods. Thinking of that day in the woods leaves me with a warm feeling in my chest.
The feeling of things matter more than their logic. My most illogical moves have brought me the most happiness. This doesn’t mean it’s time for me to be reckless and blow my savings or quit my job. But it does mean it’s time for me to loosen the grip a little bit. Start chasing feelings instead of tidy narratives- Lord knows I couldn’t will those into existence if I tried (and I’ve tried). My English professors would call this a paradigm shift. Let’s hope it sticks.
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