Bad stuff doesn’t happen to me
<BEGIN RANT>
Here’s all you need to know about when bad things happen to good people: it shakes your confidence profoundly. Before most people have had anything bad happen to them– truly bad, like a death or a serious illness or injury – the sight of someone in a wheelchair or being driven away in an ambulance elicits a moment of sympathy and, at most, a sincere-yet-shakable “what if?”, but such feelings are usually cast aside with the convenient and convincing belief that “bad stuff doesn’t happen to me.” But once a couple of bad things do happen to you, or a loved one, the tampening effect that “bad stuff doesn’t happen to me” has on your psyche (because, indeed, something really bad has just happened) abates, and suddenly the disquieting-yet-quickly shakable thoughts of sympathy and empathy become a massive, crushing weight. If you happen to also be a believer in the laws of probability, and aware of the bias of mean reversion — that in a truly random scenario previous outcomes do not impact future outcomes, which is to say, if you flip a coin to tails ten times in a row, what are the chances of it coming up heads on the 11th toss? 50 percent — then you’re doubly screwed, because now the “what are the odds?” tamping effect is also removed. So now that fleeting dread you occasionally feel – is a brain tumor causing my headache? Could my kid’s stomach ache is the onset of Crohn’s? — can’t be dismissed by either “bad stuff doesn’t happen to me” or “what are the odds?”. Those completely false but unfailingly liberating thoughts lose all of their power. And that’s when you find yourself staring at the ceiling at night, or riding the train with a persistent feeling of doom, or perpetually overreacting to otherwise banal events.
There are, I suppose, those who never have the faculties to utilize “bad stuff doesn’t happen to me” or “what are the odds?” during thoughts of despair. They’re called neurotics. As any neurotic would tell you, it’s not a pleasant way to live. And there may be others who, no matter how many bad things happen, never lose faith (religious zealots? nut jobs?). But, alas, for most us, bad things have profound effects: We take an extra look both ways before crossing, fret a little more when a loved one is late arriving home. We sleep less, drink more, find solace more elusive. We spending a lot of time asking: “Why? Why?”
That’s what happens when bad things happen to good people.
<END RANT>