Good Things Can Happen to You in Your Life

The internet can give the (inaccurate!) impression that everything is bad. Don't believe it.

The internet is sad sack. Spend too much time in this space and you’ll end up self-diagnosed with multiple terrible problems and estranged from your own family.

I don’t know why that is. People who have great lives (maybe?) don’t spend a lot of time writing about them. They don’t want to be seen as bragging. I saw a smart person recently say this is why the discourse about child rearing and marriage is so negative online.

If you speak about being happy, for example, in your family life, or genuinely liking anything, there is a whole miserable crowd that comes out of the woodwork who finds a reason to be offended. Only people who are very online will remember this anecdote, but do any of you remember the infamous incident on twitter where a woman Tweeted that she loved to sit in her garden with her spouse or boyfriend — IDK — and drink coffee in the morning? And then 10,000 people at replied her about how offended they were and how it was “privileged” to drink coffee, etc. etc. It was so insane. IDK what to say except misery is contagious and the internet is a magnet for it.

Hopefully most people are able to see all this for what it is and keep a rational mental distance from it. Things are intense right now, politically and socially. All that being said, the point I really want to make is don’t rule out the very real possibility that very good — great!, amazing — things, can happen in your life.

You could, if you haven’t already, meet a romantic partner/spouse whatever who is very kind and generous and loyal. And your mutual support helps both of you blossom into a better version of yourselves.

You could have a child who is so funny and cute you can’t believe it. Who’s smarter and better than you. Who really does “light up the room” like the cliche about murder victims.

You could accomplish something important in your career. Something that genuinely makes people’s lives better. You could work with people you admire and trust toward a goal that’s bigger than yourself. Become known in your field.

You could start a business that is a success. Employs people. Gives you the flexibility to spend more time with your kids or buy a second house, IDK.

You could be a life-of-the-party type who glues your whole social network together and officiates all your friends’ weddings. And looks amazing in your late 40s.

You could be the kind of mother that even 20 years after your death, your kids still talk about you all the time. Are constantly writing weepy tributes to online. A giant, a legend almost in the lives of the people you were closest to.

You could have some creative success. Get to give a graduation speech like Jennifer Coolidge did here (so good!).

You could write a joke on twitter that goes so viral even your mom sees it.

Your city’s basketball team could make it to the conference finals (even though mine didn’t: SOB!). You could witness greatness with someone you are close to.

You could watch your child, over the course of a year, go from being a struggling reader to a competent one and learn to like reading.

You could remain friends with someone you were friends with when you were 8 years old and when you visit, still admire and love her and relate to her so much.

You could get to travel to places you’d never imagined. Learn something from a culture that is different from your own. Maybe you have a generous friend from another culture and they’re willing to share a little bit of their culture with you. (What an honor!)

One day you could wake up and out of the blue become obsessed with something new and cool, like birdwatching or anime or photography and a whole new world could open up to you that’s full of delights.

You could pay off your house. Fill it with little treasures.

You could be the kind of person other people admire. That helps someone when they’re going through something really difficult.

You could get sober. And see the world with fresh eyes.

None of these things are all that unattainable. Or at least one of them probably is attainable. Good things happen all the time every day. There is so much possibility, even now, for happiness and growth and beauty.

I used to work in newspapers very briefly. And I worked for this chain of suburban newspapers, my first job out of college. And I spent a lot of time writing about “family fun fairs” and amateur art shows and fundraisers for people with cancer, that kind of thing. At the time I thought it was sorta boring. I had an editor at the time, she has gone on to be very successful, said to me something that was kinda profound and stuck with me all these years later.

She said she that the kind of reporting we did there was more true to life than the kind of stuff at the big-city newspapers, where random murders or whatever gloomy thing hogged the spotlight.

I don’t know if it’s just my age, being in my early 40s, or what. But I want to encourage people. In some ways, my own life has turned out better than I ever imagined. To some degree we are limited only by our own imaginations. That’s what Coolidge said in her very, very good speech.

I’ve always been a critical person. I am inclined toward picking things apart. Maybe that’s why I ended up being very online in the first place. And there is plenty to be critical of. But real life is complicated. And at the risk of sounding like a business influencer on Linkedin, if we’re gonna be honest we have to admit, those people sorta have a point.