I’m not crazy about problems but I do like resolving them.
Depends a lot on the problem, of course.
I like little problems like unwashed dishes in the sink. The solution is pretty easy. Wash ‘em by hand or throw them in the dishwasher. The resolution is the same.
Then there are the big problems. A marriage on a precipitous downhill slide. A job that started out fine but has been tangled up and thwarted by an atmosphere of pettiness. A cancer diagnosis. A child sliding farther away from you into a serious drug habit.
No quick fixes to any of these situations. Each problem demands its’ own unique approach. Each demands a different level of engagement and attention.
We sometimes have enough control over a certain situation to see a positive outcome. But at other times, we simply don’t. The worst is, sometimes we have no idea whatsoever how things will go or how they will turn out. We just have to grit our teeth and press on.
Uncertainty is a bugbear for me. And yet, uncertainty is what life is. I don’t think I am alone here. We all struggle to impose order on chaos whatever sphere of life we are operating in. Career. Education. Home environment. Family. Gardens. And sometimes, we even try to impose order on our love relationships with questionable results.
But we impose order to achieve results. Order can create the conditions for a positive outcome. The wrinkle is we are led to believe that the order we have learned to impose is the only way to achieve something.
I used to be sensitive to keeping up with the chronological order of living life with my peers. I was aghast at those who delayed formal schooling after high school. “They’ll never catch up,” I believed. I couldn’t imagine parents going to university. “How could they possibly attend courses and raise kids at the same time?”
An out-of-wedlock pregnancy before university was tantamount to career and romantic suicide. I was a very narrow-minded young person. I was a product of my time. I learned those beliefs. I did not come up with them on my own.
When I read a story the other day about a 100-year-old woman who graduated from university with her first degree, I celebrated her achievement and her gutsiness. As I read somewhere else, but for Rosa parks, blacks might still be riding in the back of city buses.
Nature has its own order and rules. But it does not necessarily approximate the order rigidly imposed on our social systems.
If that were so, apartheid would never have been upended. The civil rights movement would never have had traction. Most women would still be supporting male colleagues in secretarial pools and strictly administrative staff roles.
There are benchmarks in the scripts of social change that mark the resolution of certain social problems and inequities. It is far from perfect science. Getting to a place of resolution can be gappy and inconsistent. The trick is to keep moving forward.
The problem must be identified and brought to light before it can be addressed. Otherwise, we likely wouldn’t even be aware there was an issue. A new order is often born out of chaos and disruption. Revolution often leads to resolution. And still, any resolution will never be a perfect solution.
Challenging problems is much like living life. A start-stop process of learning and relearning and failing and getting up and starting over again. Once we get that, then we can rest easier in the knowledge that “the world is unfolding as it should.”
We learn that life is a journey and not a destination. So it is with the problems in our lives and their ultimate resolution. Our job is to face problems squarely and work on them to resolve them in aid of our own growth.
Looked at in that way, problems are not only inevitable but opportunities for learning and growth. And yes. Even in the face of a child’s heartbreaking life choices or a cancer diagnosis. We must accept what is and move forward from that point. Few life problems are solved by ostriches with their heads in the sand.
Expressive Compulsive 