Observations: Earthquakes and Fretting
I’m not saying being preparedis a bad thing. The motto from my time as a child in scouting programs still feels like a decent idea.
What I am saying is that I think the moments where you suddenly realize, “Oh, holy wow, I live in Utah and science says we’re due for a big one at any moment,” maybe should not come up often enough to cause you to live in immobilizing fear.
Due to news of a large earthquake in Alaska, my friend and I just had a lengthy conversation about the frequency of these kind of realizations that we have as Utahans. We discussed the various settings in our lives that cause thoughts of earthquakes and their potential to impact our safety. There are so many random moments where we think about whether the old building we’re in has been retrofitted, whether the house could make it, or if we’re ready to jump out of the way of that dresser, painting, or chandelier.
We agreed that it feels like a good idea to have these thoughts enough that we have some mental and physical preparedness for if/when the moment actually arrives.
Then, what we got talking about was how focusing too much on any events in the future can actually be a detriment to living happily in the here and now. Yes, this is true of living in fear of future natural disasters, but it’s also true of living in excessive expectation of good in our futures.
Yeah, we should have moments of dreaming, hoping, and planning for good things.
However, just like living in fear to our detriment, living in expectation of perfection can be incapacitating as well.
I think what we realized is that there’s a balance we all ought to strike on the subject of the future. We should prepare for good and bad in our futures, but not at the cost of sacrificing being happy that we’re alive in the present.
These aren’t groundbreaking thoughts, but I think remembering them is ideal for living stable and happy lives while the earth isn’t shattering and perfection is out of reach.