I can’t do anything about bad luck or anything else that is out of my control. I can’t avoid problems. The avoidance of misery could result in the inadvertent avoidance of opportunity and seems like a misery in itself. I can’t just ignore problems or shut them out either, especially when those problems involve my own children. So what do I do with these problems? Do I have to do anything with them other than accept that they are a part of my life?

Ever since I was a child, I have had an absolute sense of fairness and justice. If something isn’t fair, it makes me rage. Sometimes, I mistake misfortune for injustice. If something is unfair or unjust, ruminating on it doesn’t make it better. It just makes me feel like a victim and then I get angry. Being angry is okay, but it doesn’t solve the problem or make things right. So I guess I can’t act like a victim, because that will just augment the issue.

Some say that thinking positively will translate into positive things, thus reframing ones problems and trying to find something positive such as a life lesson or silver lining, will make things better. Last year, my dear grandmother died. I watched her die a horrible, slow death. It was a horrific experience that I am still struggling to come to terms with. How can one find positivity in that? I promise you, it didn’t teach her or anybody else a damned thing other than life can be really crappy. There is no silver lining. The experience was shit, and you can’t dress shit up. Agonizing over what lessons one is supposed to get from monumentally awful life experiences can be torture, and oftentimes it leads one down the ‘why me’ path when we struggle to find meaning in them, and then we are back to being an angry victim. And isn’t habitually reframing negative experiences a form of denial? Denial that bad things happen and a belief that only good things disguised as awful things happen?

Nobody’s life is free of difficulties and complications. Everyone experiences misery and pain. So if nobody is exempt, perhaps there is more wisdom in the adage ‘Shit Happens’ than we realise?

I need to accept that life is littered with difficulties and difficult people. That isn’t to say that when I see an injustice, I will ignore it, it just means that I need to stop feeling as if my difficulties make me special. The universe isn’t picking on me. Shit happens to everyone.