Recently, BB (as always) gave me excellent advice. Basically, it was for me to chill the fk out and stop asking “Why?” because it is an utterly useless question to pose.

Why this and Why that and Why is this happening and Why did that happen and Why isn’t this working?

Arguably, it is this as first question to which our minds default when we are facing a heavy emotional situation. Someone mistreats us, someone tries to cheat us, someone tries to pretend they had nothing to do with our pain, and our immediate response is “why?” Why did this have to happen (to me)?

I think we ask this question because it’s supposed to explain away our pain. Meaning: You are feeling crushed and ripped to pieces because (insert answer to “why”… And where we do not have the answer to this question, we enter into an exhausting near nihilistic state of: You are feeling crushed and ripped to pieces because for nothing… and holy sh/t when this is our answer at a time we are crumbled on the floor incapable of picking ourselves up. The inability to answer this question and all which are derived from it? It’s us, laying on the floor, with the weight of the pain keeping us flat, and then an additional 27 tons of metal randomly plunked on top of our heads.

Basically, not the greatest place to be.

The painful reality is that there is no really concrete answer to why, when it comes to human emotion. Because we are not math equations, and we do not 2 + 2 = 4. In fact, I would say that we, as humans, are maybe an approximation of 2 / 17 = (0.56 + red – a salt and pepper shaker x 712) to the 0.19th power. Or something.

To the extent of our rational capacity, sometimes shit just happens more often than not, and for no discernable reason. This is not to say that I believe in coincidences, because I do not. It is to say that I recognize that humans call things random only because we do not possess the capacity to see and understand and calculate all at once, the kabillions of variables which affect human action and choice.

Then what’s the alternative? The alternative is a variation of BB’s eloquent: Stop asking WHY? and my not so eloquent: Chill the fk out. A variation because the mere act itself is a cushioning to the blow we have just been dealt (and so necessary to a degree), and it is within the space of “why” that we can reflect on our own actions which may have led to the situation in which we find ourselves (and so necessary to a great extent).

I believe that it might be as simple as recognizing the dangers of asking “Why?” Being cognisant that becoming mired in it, obsessed with it, and losing yourself in it is potentially far more devastating than the pain which gave rise to the question. Flagging yourself every single time you ask it and subsequently cutting yourself off when your time spent asking this question is longer than the experience questioned, when you spend more time looking back than looking at how you move forward into a healthier space.

I’m going to try and do this, which means that I will have to actually cease and desist my relied upon behaviour. And because I am slow on the uptake, this will be a little bit of a challenge.

Godspeed to me, and to you with whom some of the above has resonated.

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Photo from the gorgeous family of Atikinka.