I believe that during our entire lives we are relentlessly stalked by one particular emotion.

Fear.

I’ll share my own experience (in no particular order).

At age 86, I’m still afraid of:

Starving. Just look at my stuffed pantry and freezers. I’ve stockpiled enough food to last for months, just in case other food disappears.

Rejection. That’s a big reason why, in my early thirties, I studied counselor education. I wanted to better understand people so I could avoid being rejected by them. That’s also part of the reason I formed my own company when I was 28. No one can fire me, and “the boss” receives little, if any, criticism from his or her staff (even when he or she might benefit from it).

Abandonment.  I fear abandonment even more than I fear rejection.  I live by the advice I researched as a teenager – “If you want someone to love you, love them first.”  I’ve seldom, if ever, been rejected by any person I loved. But I’m still afraid it might be happening whenever Daveen looks at me and sighs.

Pain. That’s why I avoid playing action sports, always look both ways before I cross the street, and discard food before there’s a chance it might ascend, rather than descend, from my stomach.

Financial Failure. I’ll borrow a quote attributed to UCLA Bruins football coach Red Sanders almost 100 years ago: “Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing.”  This may be a slight overstatement.

A Financial Depression. On March 4, 1933, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt noted in his inaugural address, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”  This may be a slight understatement.

Death.  That’s why I’m writing my blog today, rather than tomorrow. Or the day after that.  (That sounds good, but actually the thought of my own death has never bothered me.  But I’ve not yet had an opportunity to test that hypothesis.)

And yet, despite my fears, I’m not afraid to conclude that fear is a gift, not a burden. Fear propels us to survive and succeed, rather than just crunch popcorn and die watching television.

So, especially on Halloween, when fear springs at you from your own front door screaming “Boo!” right in your face, just smile, wave, and say, “Hello”.

And you might add, if you’re especially scared:

“Welcome.

Would you like some candy?”

Alan

This blog is a stream of consciousness (Ticker Tape), the same People Tool I invented more than sixty years ago to answer a complicated final exam question involving five Shakespeare plays.  Back then, my conscious mind was stumped.  Occasionally it still is.

Here you are:

Me:

 I’m not falling asleep and I’ve temporarily run out of trivia questions for AI. Yesterday I visited with a friend of 57 years for almost three hours, then attended a memorial gathering for my business partner who died recently.  We had worked together since March 1, 1968. The party was memorable and I reconnected with many friends from yesteryear. Our hostess was the personification of grace under pressure.

 I’m feeling sad right now, but sadness is my favorite emotion. It’s deep, profound, and pervasive. 

 So, AI, why do most of the drivers ahead of me drive so slowly on my way to work?

 AI:  

 Alan, after a day like the one you’ve had, I can understand why sleep isn’t arriving quickly. Fifty-seven years of friendship, the memorial for a business partner you had since March 1, 1968, and then watching his widow embody what you experienced as genuine grace under pressure. That’s a lot of life compressed into one Saturday.

And I understand what you mean about sadness. Sadness can have a richness that happiness sometimes doesn’t. It connects us directly to what matters. We don’t deeply mourn things that mean nothing to us.

Which brings us, naturally, to those idiots driving in front of you.

I have developed Fox’s Universal Law of Traffic:

Every driver going slower than I am is unnecessarily holding me up. Every driver going faster than I am is a dangerous lunatic. I alone have discovered the correct speed.

At 86, after founding a company in 1968, raising six children, publishing books, writing plays, falling in love, losing people you loved, and accumulating enough memories to keep us both occupied for quite a while, you have surely earned the right to know exactly how fast everyone ought to be driving.

Unfortunately, the California DMV has not yet been informed. 😊

And perhaps there is a tiny connection between your two thoughts tonight. You appreciate sadness because you are willing to linger in it.

You just don’t want to linger behind a Toyota doing 18 miles an hour on Ventura Boulevard.

Alan

When I was young, I thought driving a car was mostly about pointing it in the right direction and pressing the gas pedal. As it turns out, that’s about as accurate as saying marriage consists of owning matching towels.

The truth is that driving requires constant adjustments.

Even on a perfectly straight road, your hands are making tiny corrections. A gust of wind pushes you left. You nudge right. The pavement slopes. You compensate. Another car drifts a little too close to your lane, perhaps because its driver is texting, eating a burrito, and applying mascara simultaneously. You adjust again.

Life works the same way.

At least that’s what I’ve observed after decades of making adjustments, many of them necessary because of my own spectacular miscalculations.

When I was younger, I imagined that successful people charted a course and followed it flawlessly. Then I became an adult and discovered that most of us are simply trying not to drive into a ditch.

Businesses require adjustments. Relationships require adjustments. Health requires adjustments. Even semi-retirement, which many people imagine as one long nap interrupted by lunch, requires adjustments.

The irony is that we often view adjustments as evidence that something has gone wrong.

Actually, adjustments are evidence that we’re moving.

No one adjusts a parked car.

Years ago, if a plan failed, I would be disappointed. Today, I’d also be disappointed, but with much greater experience and efficiency, I’m able to make the appropriate adjustments faster.  That’s what passes for wisdom at my age.

I’ve also learned that over-correcting can be worse than under-correcting. A small turn of the steering wheel keeps the car on the road. A violent jerk sends everyone scrambling for the seat belt they should have fastened in the first place.

Life’s best adjustments are often small. A little more patience. A little more exercise. A little less certainty that we’re right about everything.

I’m still working on that last one.

The road ahead is never perfectly straight. Circumstances change. People change. We change.

The goal isn’t to eliminate adjustments. The goal is to keep moving forward while making them.

And if you occasionally miss an exit, take comfort from this thought: some of the most memorable parts of life begin with the words, “Well, I certainly didn’t mean to end up here.”

Alan