Everything happens for a reason and other things people say when they have no idea that things may or may not actually get better

"Almost the chief mystery of life is what makes one do things. Let the reader
look back over the path he has traveled and examine searchingly and faithfully
the reasons, impressions, motives, occasions which led him to this or that
decisive step in his career… Small people, casual remarks, and little things
very often shape our lives more powerfully than the deliberate, solemn advice of
great people at critical moments. Men and women as often as not address
themselves to serious emergencies with resolution and with a conscious desire to
choose the best way. But usually in our brief hazardous existence some trifle,
some accident, some quite unexpected and irrelevant fact has laid the board in
such a way as to determine the move we make. We have always to be on our guard
against being thrown off our true course by chance and circumstance; and the
glory of human nature lies in our seeming capacity to exercise conscious control
of our own destiny. In a broad view, large principles, a good heart, high aims,
a firm faith, we may find some charts and a compass for our voyage. Still, as we
lean over the stern of the ship and watch the swirling eddies in our wake, the
most rigid and resolute of us must feel how many currents are playing their part
in the movements of the vessel that bears us onwards."Winston Churchill

I got to thinking today about the phrase “everything happens for a reason”, and realized it is one of those things you say when you have no idea what to think or do because you’re completely adrift. It’s an optimistic thought based on the idea that most things out there are not worse than how you feel right at that moment and you are just hoping that over time things will improve and hindsight will cast your memory in a favorable glow helping you feel that the journey from that bad place led you to somewhere better.

Earlier today I remembered very vividly the day back in April where when I had been laid off and called friends and family to share the news. One particular conversation came to mind. I had called a very dear friend and left her the message. I then heard that that same friend had just the previous night had an accident and fallen in the shower and gotten quite hurt. When I called again to check on her she kept trying to talk about me. I had reassured her I was fine with the statement “I’ll be ok. I know everything happens for a reason and I’m sure this is for the best in the long run. Now how about your face?” I had no idea why things happened at that point and the reality was I felt shell-shocked and rudderless with no idea what was going to happen. It would be a while before I didn’t feel those things anymore. Now I can barely remember those feelings. I mean I can in the way that you can feel a thorn in your foot that you couldn’t get out and calluses have grown around. It’s with a sort of detached almost triumph that I’ve boxed those feelings up and put them away.

I had thought that this was one of the most devastating things that would happen to me. I had fought very hard to remain optimistic and put on the bravest face because I did not want to give anything up about me to anyone but my close friends and family. I had taken it so personally. My work was the biggest thing I was proud of in my life, if not the only thing and I had wrapped myself so much in my job that the elimination of my job, felt like the elimination of part of me. I had no perspective about the many worse things that can and do happen. At that point, I was miserable.

The reality is so clear. It wasn’t personal. It was business. Necessity changed the world I worked in and there was no future for me in the vision they had created. It had nothing to do with my awards, or me – they needed to mix things up to stay afloat and that’s that. And I have been thinking about not that everything happens for a reason, but that everything that happens opens up new possibilities. I have always tried to work on the premise that it’s not what happens to you that’s important but instead what you do as a result with what you're given that matters.

I am looking forward to working again. Working is fun and a great way to learn new things, to challenge yourself, make money, contribute to something, and meet new people. I have discovered that for me, it will not be my primary antidote for boredom, loneliness or insecurity. Those feelings are stirred up internally and need to be dealt with and not masked with business. It’s ok to be bored sometimes. It’s really ok to be lonely sometimes. And everyone is insecure sometimes. Working on myself, and exploring new passions, and working to spend time with people that make me feel good are much more satisfying to my soul than checking my work email at 2:00 on a Sunday afternoon because I don’t think I have anything better to do and not because anything actually important may happen. See the thing is, I want to work and have a job I love and look forward to and get excited about throwing myself into. I love that rush. But I don’t want my work to be the only thing in my life I’m proud of, or excited about, or motivated by. You’re not your job and really, would you want to be? Well if my job was lottery winner or queen of the universe then of course, but otherwise no.

I am looking forward to working again. A new workplace presents an entire world of new possibilities. No one there has seen all my outfits, or my cute shoes. They have not heard all my stories which I’m certain run thin with my existing friends. I am excited to make new friends. My circle could benefit from some new blood and I have some great single friends that might like my potential new friends. At a new office they would know almost nothing about me. It’s a huge opportunity for reinvention.

Does everything happen for a reason? I doubt there is some power out there that saw I needed to reinvent myself into a person who gets my pride from my accomplishments, and my relationships, the quality of people in my life, my projects, my writing, and my resilience. I don’t believe there was some design that recognized I was unhappy and set the gears in motion. Can I say with confidence that I am better because of this? Yes. I made this for myself and wouldn’t change a thing if I could.

Would I say to someone in a similar situation as I found myself in three and a half months ago that everything happens for a reason? No. I would say – what a fantastic opportunity to really reinvent yourself. Will it be really hard at times, of course. Will you likely feel it was worth it at the end. Definitely.