Regardless of how you feel about his view of life after life, he makes a good point about worry. There is really no room for needless concern about the future. I like what Ralph Waldo Emerson said about worry:
"Some of your hurts you have cured,If you’re like me, more than once you’ve found yourself enduring “torments of grief” from evil that has not yet arrived and probably never will. Almost without our being aware, healthy concern for the future can be transformed into cancerous worry. “What if?” we ask. “What if something happens?” “What if things don’t turn out?” “What if…?” Worry can become an all-too-constant companion we might wish would just go away and leave us alone.
And the sharpest you still have survived,
But what torments of grief you endured
From evil that never arrived."
And I’m sure about one thing: that my high anxiety about the future doesn't help me with tomorrow's troubles; it only succeeds in ruining today's happiness. I am sure that needless worry, more than anything else, has kept me from really living. It has never helped me solve real problems; it has only destroyed what happiness I might have found in the present. What is worry other than habitual fear of the future? It is a habit of feeling fear. And, like any other habit, it can be hard to break. But also, like any other habit, it CAN be replaced with a better one.
So, what might happen if you should decide to let go of that needless worry - just for today? Can you do it, for one day? What do you have to lose besides anxiety? And look what you may gain – a chance to REALLY LIVE.
Sounds like decent trade to me.
-- Steve Goodier
Image: flickr.com/E Greens
