I can handle bad things happening to good people.
March 17, 2009 – 2:29 amThere’s a book by a Rabbi named Harold Kushman titled When bad things happen to good people.
That I can deal with. It’s hard, and it sucks, but I can cope. What I’m struggling with at the moment is when good people cause bad things to happen. When good people intentionally or unintentionally hurt each other, when they get defensive, when they get so caught up in the good they’re trying to do that they forget to see the other folks are trying to do good too. And then bystanders get caught in the initially well-intentioned crossfire.
I can’t articulate it very well, but it makes me sad to bursting. And I’m happy to bursting at the same time, because they are good people, and changing the world and all that jazz – and burning smoke and charring gashes across the land they’re trying to save. You can’t do surgery without the scars. Sometimes they heal.
I am a sucker. I know how much abuse I’m taking and how much I’m giving, and it’s freely given; I don’t expect anything back from it. It’s a gift. Or a gamble, depending on how you look at it. You give, you hope for the best, and sometimes you don’t get it, but you chose long ago to be okay with that. (That’s why you’re an idealistic sucker. Why do you continue to choose to be one?)
Tired, but in a different way than I’ve been used to being in the past 11 years. Not wrecked; just tired.
I need something to lean against right now. It’s 3:30am. A pillow works; I’ll go with that.
Despite the tone of this post, it actually has been a pretty good day – a nice walk and lunch with Jeffrey, a gorgeous evening of reading. The reading makes me think.
4 Responses to “I can handle bad things happening to good people.”
. . . Why do you continue to choose to be one?
Can you really choose to be otherwise? I had a debate over this years ago. Someone was debating with me whether I could help being an idealist. Do I choose to think this way, or can I not help it? My answer then was “you can choose your attitude like you can choose your underwear.” -something my mom used to tell me.
Years later, I think what makes a person willing to give and give and gamble may just be innate. What makes a person see the potential and the best in things is deeply part of who they are, not just their choice moment by moment (I say this based on my personal experience, so I’d welcome feedback). However, even if I am learning to choose my words more reasonably, and be more “rational”. . . when caught off guard, or in the heat of the moment?
idealist comes out my ears.
So, do you think you could choose to be otherwise?
By erin on Mar 17, 2009
I could – but it would be extraordinarily difficult, take a long time and years (probably decades) of constant reminders to revise my actions, and… really not be worth it, all that work to be less happy and effective.
So yes, the choice is there, but I would never make it that far, and I know this to the extent that I don’t worry that I’ll make that choice. Kind of like “I could, with lego bricks, build the great wall of China to scale.” I could. But the magnitude of extended, repeated effort is so great and pointless that I won’t. (Insert long causal chain of choosing to choose to not choose to choose… etc. here!)
By Mel on Mar 17, 2009
agreed. happy st. patrick’s day.
By erin on Mar 18, 2009
You get real things done by focusing and working on the goal, almost to the exclusion of everything else. Just because they’re a “good” person doesn’t mean that they can pay attention to everything.
They probably should have stepped back and looked at the bigger picture. That said, they chose their problem and approach to it for a reason (that’s valid to them). Even if it is a band-aid rather than attacking the root cause of all the world’s problems: forks.
By Mark on Mar 19, 2009