3748123220_d80cd70117_z

 “Worry is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do but never gets you anywhere.”             Erma Bombeck

I know it will never completely go away. Some days I accept this. I find peace, like the sleeping little girl, eyes closed, dreaming about nothing and everything. Other days, I struggle.  Oh, how I climb the thousand ladders of what if’s that spiral out of control, one lopsided thought at a time.

Stop. I write. Stop. I say to myself. This is pointless. But I still continue to battle an invisible opponent I created.

Natural-born worrier. That is me.

Yesterday when I read this quote by Erma Bombeck, it slapped me in the face. Contemplating all of the wasted time I’ve spent worrying about all those things I thought would happen. Guess what? These hypotheticals never materialized.

Ms. Bombeck is right. Worrying steals from living. But yet, like an addict, I go back. I mull the mundane and rare.  I worry when I will get that phone call or that news that changes everything. I have experienced 3 life changing, direction turning, what is the point of all these events. But the irony? These were 3 instances I NEVER worried about.

You know what? You cannot worry away what will happen. Call it fate, God, chaos theory, or coincidence. What is meant to pierce your gut, will. What is meant to take you by surprise, will. Fairy tales are not real life. Accepting this in the abstract is comforting. Living it is liberating. We all experience those moments, where we wonder, “How am I going to get through this?” By enduring it, we get through. You. Me. All of us. We move forward, even if it feels a little backward.

My realization? As much as I know worrying will get me nowhere, it is an old friend, one that offers comfort, but also makes me yell at the top of my lungs. Like that slight creak in the old rocking chair, it will always be a part of me.

IMAGE VIA FLICKR BY AVA LOWERY