Take All the Goods from All the Bads - Life Road Bumps
"Bads" are inevitable. So are "Goods," and if someone doesn't think so, they're an extreme pessimist, and even then, they're exaggerating.
I don't want to make this a long and obvious post, so I'm mainly bringing it up for thought. Let's say you have an overall fine or wonderful week, and then the Bad comes. During the Bad, no matter how short it is, you can manage to undermine much of the Good, and come close to convincing yourself the Good wasn't worth it. Now if you really thought about this, you know you're being ridiculous, but anger can do some embarrassing things.
After I had a recent bout of this (in my case, the Bad was only about 30 minutes, and it really wasn't threatening the Good, but it lead me to these thoughts), I realized that I don't even remember the Bad, and that the Good completely overwhelmed it and the Good is how I remember the week. I think this might even be true if you have a period of time that is a majority of Bad. Good just seems to be much more powerful.
I was trying to think about this logically. My first thought was that when I have good memories about something that involved both Good and Bad, the reason is that I forgot about and put the Bad aside. My preposition today is that putting the Bad aside is sometimes desired, but not necessary. In fact, I think the Bad only reinforces the Good. When you realize that the Bad was literally nothing compared to the Good, then you realize how good the Good must be.
I would hope that as I go through life, the number of Bad occurances will decrease. This is optimistic. The truth is that as some things get easier or at least more familiar, others will get harder; and in addition, there are always going to be new things dumped on my plate. So, in the optimism that I subscribe to, the Bads should be expected, but the Good can always trump the bad if we let it.
When I look at unhappily married men at work, I am honestly confident that I will never be one of them. But I'm curious how they got there. Did the Bad eventually take up 51% of their marriage and now they write it off as all Bad? Are their Bads really not that overwhelming, but they stopped (or never started) concentrating on the Goods? Or are they lazy and stopped trying to produce more Goods? Did they assume that Goods were supposed to always be natural and not require work?
I don't want to make this a long and obvious post, so I'm mainly bringing it up for thought. Let's say you have an overall fine or wonderful week, and then the Bad comes. During the Bad, no matter how short it is, you can manage to undermine much of the Good, and come close to convincing yourself the Good wasn't worth it. Now if you really thought about this, you know you're being ridiculous, but anger can do some embarrassing things.
After I had a recent bout of this (in my case, the Bad was only about 30 minutes, and it really wasn't threatening the Good, but it lead me to these thoughts), I realized that I don't even remember the Bad, and that the Good completely overwhelmed it and the Good is how I remember the week. I think this might even be true if you have a period of time that is a majority of Bad. Good just seems to be much more powerful.
I was trying to think about this logically. My first thought was that when I have good memories about something that involved both Good and Bad, the reason is that I forgot about and put the Bad aside. My preposition today is that putting the Bad aside is sometimes desired, but not necessary. In fact, I think the Bad only reinforces the Good. When you realize that the Bad was literally nothing compared to the Good, then you realize how good the Good must be.
I would hope that as I go through life, the number of Bad occurances will decrease. This is optimistic. The truth is that as some things get easier or at least more familiar, others will get harder; and in addition, there are always going to be new things dumped on my plate. So, in the optimism that I subscribe to, the Bads should be expected, but the Good can always trump the bad if we let it.
When I look at unhappily married men at work, I am honestly confident that I will never be one of them. But I'm curious how they got there. Did the Bad eventually take up 51% of their marriage and now they write it off as all Bad? Are their Bads really not that overwhelming, but they stopped (or never started) concentrating on the Goods? Or are they lazy and stopped trying to produce more Goods? Did they assume that Goods were supposed to always be natural and not require work?
posted by shawn @ 10:16 AM
5 Comments:
At 5:44 AM,
Chris Trumble said…
question. do the unhappily married men at work SO unhappy that they are sharing their marriage woes aloud in their place of employment?
At 5:54 AM,
shawn said…
YES! But more often, it's in response to a 27 yr old friend talking about getting married. They do the sarcastic joking about why not to get married. But at the heart of it, there is a lot of truth.
To be fair, there are other married guys who don't complain, and they seem to be more content and less stressed.
At 7:04 AM,
Chris Trumble said…
i always have this general picture in the back of my head of how things are going at any given time. its almost like an abstract pie chart, and the good is white and the bad is dark. if something is bothering me, its this dark spot in my head, and the white is trying to engulf it. the good taking over the bad.s ometimes i'll even try to remember what has my stomach in knots because theres this thing thats getting to me, but it's in the background because i guess i'd just rather be happy. it sounds really crazy in type.
At 9:35 AM,
Anonymous said…
I didn't realize you had any new posts until yesterday. My internet is crappy and did not refresh.
ANYWAY, you mentioned that good is more powerful than bad. I agree in a way. To me, its not that "good" as some abstract entity is a powerful thing that dominates "evil". Of course, this might indeed be the case, but I'd rather focus on what I can see--so I think that in regard to what we prefer, humans have the opportunity to change their focus. Pain is unpleasant for lots of reasons, mostly relative to how we are created.
Like in your previous post you mentioned going outside in the cold. I have been trying to change my perception of pain as well. It used to be that if a tiny splatter of boiling oil would jump out of a frying pan and onto my skin, I would yelp and back away, drop whatever i was holding, be all dramatic. Or if something was, from my point of view, too hot, I would drop it or refuse to pick it up. I have found that my tolerance for pain was too low. Now I may pull my hand away a bit if oil splatters, but I am more able to just ignore it. That is a good feeling. Learning to accept a little pain does seem to be somehow satisfying, even strengthening.
Although this is true, and pain is relative to our perception of it, we tend to prefer not to experience it. We lean toward good things, pleasure. I think this is part of why humanity advances as it does. We crave improvement, evolution, better things, avoidance of pain-including the pain of ignorance and primitive mentalities-in any form.
For the men at your work, there was probably a point where pleasure simply declined. We tend to get used to things that at one point amazed us. I hear a new song and it blows my mind, but then I get used to it. I buy a new car and I am driving excitement, but then its just my dumb old car. While I don't want to say that that will never happen to my marriage for some reason, it seems like my parents really care for each other still. There is probably something there that is also in my brain somehow, and it makes me care about my relationship with Jess. I am glad for that. It seems like you can get whatever you want in the world, but if you don't have somebody that you are close to, that you genuinely love, it is pointless.
I wonder if the goal is finding new pleasure, appreciating new things, being willing to change, a priority shift from physical excitement to excitement of tried and true friendship. I usually hate the words "tried and true" because it sounds so traditionalist, but the fact is, in developing the personal "tradition" of being married, relying on it, I am creating a friend that I am closer to than anybody else. That seems great to me.
blah blah blah...sorry i ramble...
At 10:19 AM,
shawn said…
Pain in the right amounts is kind of pleasurable. Well, I guess the overall experience is pleasurable, not the actual pain. Like the small spot of boiling oil that you ignored and you felt satisfied--maybe that you "overcame" something.
When I get restless and feel I need to do something active, what I probably miss most is the running. But the pain is part of what I miss too. Like after a good workout and you can barely move the next day. Or after we played paintball. It is so satisfying to be a little bit afraid of something and then just charge out there and take it. And you realize it was totally worth it. It wouldn't give you as much of a rush if there wasn't the possibility of pain.
If you dive to hit a volleyball or catch something, the satisfaction of being successful, or even just trying, makes you totally ignore the pain. And it probably wouldn't be as satisfying without the pain because then everyone would do it without hesitation, and it would be expected.
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