It Could Always be Worse

When I was a little girl, my favorite story was called “It Could be Worse.”  The story is largely based on an old Yiddish folktale in which a man complains about the noise from his family, consults a wise Rabbi, who in turn tells him to add chickens, goats, and other livestock to his household in order to solve the problem.  The man goes to the town sage and says something like “Wise one, things are terrible for me.  My mother, my wife, and my six children live in a small house together and there is too much noise.  What should I do?  The wise elder tells the man “Get some chickens and put them in your house.  That will help with your problem of too much noise.“  The man, although a bit confused, does what the wise man says and gets a chicken to live with the already large family inside the little house.  Of course, this does not help, but instead, makes the problem worse with chickens clucking and feathers flying everywhere, and the man goes back to the wise sage for more advice.  The elder continues to make the life worse of the poor man and tells him to get a goat and then a cow, until the home if filled with utter madness.

You have probably heard this story at least once or twice, and you know the conclusion of the story and the subsequent moral it is trying to teach children.  After adding all the chaos with a bunch of barnyard animals to his already crowded and noisy home, the man can’t take it anymore and removes all the animals from inside his house.  Once they are gone, his house is quiet and enjoyable.  He notices the laughter of his children and the coziness of having his family all around him.  The Rabbi was indeed wise as he taught the poor man that although his life was difficult living in a small house with too many people, too much noise, and not enough to go around, his life could be so much worse.  He learned this first hand when he had to also live with a bunch or loud and crazy animals.  The simple man figured out that, although he didn’t have much, he had a family that was dear to him and he now was thankful for his simple and modest life.  He wasn’t able to see this gift until things were awful for him and he then realized his life was never so terrible to begin with. 

Jewish teachings are full of wonderful and thoughtful lessons.  Reading that story when I was little really had an effect on me.  I remember understanding the meaning in the story and thinking it was pretty special.  I didn’t realize then how much I’d have to reteach this lesson to myself and my children when I grew up.  There have been many times in my life - when I was sick in the hospital, when I was suffering with chronic abdominal pain, when my kids were ill in the hospital, and when my kids suffer from their bowel problems – where I’ve had to call on this teaching to bring me back down to earth and ground me.

Everyone has a sob story.  Everyone has had a few bad things happen to them, some really small and insignificant, but everyone thinks they’re a big deal.  We all get sucked into drama and the dregs of a painful event.  And many of us have trouble pulling ourselves out from the pile to see that it just really isn’t that bad.  It’s easy to get caught up feeling sorry for yourself and feeling like you’re alone and beaten down.  But the truth is, no matter how bad it is, it just could always be worse.  You might not feel like looking at it that way and you might want to keep wallowing in self-pity, but you need to look around and see that it just could be multitudes worse.  In situations when I’m feeling bad for myself because something negative is happening in my life, I remind myself of exactly what could be happening to me that would be so, so much worse.  For instance, when my kids were struggling in the hospital during their surgeries and treatments for FAP, I would look around me on my kids’ hospital floor.  I didn’t ever have to go far to see much worse suffering.  I saw a child walking down the hallway, only three years old, holding her mom’s hand and smiling in spite of her bald head and chemo treatments.  My child could be undergoing chemo and battling cancer.  It could be worse.  In the playroom, there was a seven year old girl with traction bandages over her arms and much of her chest, and her face was badly scared.  I would find out later she practically lived at the hospital because she had been burned over 70% of her body and had been receiving major skin treatments at the hospital for two years.  Her brother died in the fire.  It could be worse.  On the elevator, a mom and her son got on.  He was clearly a quadriplegic and his physical function was minimal, but he talked with his mother and they seemed to just go about their day as they waited for the elevator to arrive on the ground level.  It could be worse. 

If you aren’t looking around you for the signs that God is sending you when you are in the pits of despair feeling sorry for your situation and complaining to anyone who will listen about the terrible situation that has befallen you, then you are missing a divine opportunity to thrive.  Sure, everyone has to grieve and everyone has to feel the pain of losing, having less, and seeing things not working out right, but sometimes it’s just not bad enough to warrant such drama.  I hear people complaining everyday about small things, to a level that causes them extreme anxiety, fear, and pain.  I hear people complaining about the contractor not finishing their remodel on time, or their children getting tons of colds and viruses, or their vacation flight was majorly delayed to the Caribbean.  I have no idea why they are complaining, and they sound ridiculous.  You have the money to remodel your house, you have healthy children who might get little sicknesses but they aren’t dying of a disease, and you are lucky enough to be the minority in America that can afford an expensive vacation to paradise.  I even see people creating massive drama about pretty small things like minor surgery, a broken wrist, or treatable and avoidable problems like allergies. 

It could always be worse – you could be diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer (you’re probably going to die if that’s the case), your arm could have been severed in a terrible car accident instead of slipping on the ice and simply cracking it, and your child could have a virtually untreatable disease like Cystic Fibrosis or be waiting for a heart transplant instead of just avoiding eating dairy.  Nobody wants to hear that their problems aren’t that big of a deal, but people need to start hearing it and listening to it.  This doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck for you and that it isn’t unfortunate, but the truth is, you just shouldn’t be whining because it simply could be so, so much worse for you. 

Even through my disease and all my health problems, I think every day how much worse it could be for me and so I won’t complain.  I could have not known I had FAP and later found out as a young adult that I had late stage colon cancer.  I might have survived, but I probably would have died.  If you’ve going through chemo right now for something like breast cancer or prostate cancer, chances are statistically, you’re going to survive.  You’re going to live and be ok and enjoy more and more years on this earth with the people you love.  That a wonderful thing, not a sad thing.  Sure, it sucks to go through chemo and treatment, but it just could be so much worse.  You could be dying and watching the last days of your life go by.  But that’s not you and you get to keep moving forward.  You get to live, I get to live, and we shouldn’t be wasting this precious time focusing on the little blips on our radars.

The moral of that story “It could be Worse” is so incredible.  It’s not out there to minimize what’s going on in your life.  It’s there to pull you back up.  It’s a pick-me-up, when you’re having trouble seeing through the shit.  It’s there to keep you moving forward and upward.  It’s there to keep you in reality, and it’s there to keep you actually living – I mean finding the little joys in life that are priceless and being present to fully receive them.  If you’re not thankful for how your life is now, even if it could be a lot better, then you’re wasting time on negativity.  It won’t get you anywhere.  Looking for the little nuggets of pleasure around you will get you so much farther than having a pity party for your life.  I for one am celebrating delightful things every day, no matter how crappy of a day or life I’m having.  And I welcome you to join the party with me.