Member-only story
My daughter started back to school this week. Our district offered a choice: attend in-person or school online from home, and we chose the latter, feeling less-than-confident about the school’s ability to adequately sanitize and social distance a crowded high school. So, from the safety of our dining room table, my daughter’s senior year is underway.
The privilege of having this option isn’t lost on me. I realize just how fortunate we are that she can spend the next two months schooling from home while we wait to see what Covid-19 is going to do next. So yes, I am deeply grateful.
But even as I’m counting our blessings, I’m painfully aware of the challenges we face. Money is tight. Business is slow. The economy is struggling. Politically, we can’t agree on anything. And, well… Covid. The world as we know it will never quite be the same again.
I know I’m not alone in my anxiety. I know we’re all feeling the weight of uncertainty and it’s hard to plan a future when everything about that future is up in the air. So, we start looking for signs. Signs that tell us which way to go. Signs that show us how to mitigate our stress.
Signs that tell us everything will be okay.
But some signs aren’t so blatantly comforting. In fact — just the opposite — some signs are the in-your-face sort, essentially telling you to “suck it up.” Those signs are harder to work with, hence those signs are frequently resisted and ignored. But those signs are often the ones we need most because they push us to grow, learn and evolve.
It’s like ripping off the band-aid — do you want to baby-step around this problem for the next couple of months? Or do you want to dig in and deal with it, so you can start moving forward again? Clearly, option #2 is the better, more direct choice, but it’s also the most taxing. As a society, we don’t like change. We don’t like growth and evolution, because they’re painful. They require us to be honest about who we are and how we feel. They require us to own our shit, in the words of the eloquent Harley Quinn, and that’s rarely something we’re eager to do.
Because while we’re experts at creating and conversing about the drama that is the current fuel of our existence, we’re much…
