Going with the Flow

My live-in handyman is a worrier. His mother was a worrier. Sometimes he worries because he has nothing to worry about. Sometimes he worries about other people's worries.

Me? Not so much. More like not at all. I tell him there's no need for me to worry because he does enough for both of us.

The way I see it, worry is not a positive thing. It's fine to think about a problem and come up with a solution. But worry is not solution-based. It's fret over things you have no control over and filled with what-ifs. Worry will not affect any outcome one way or another.

For writers it's pointless to worry if an editor will accept your story or an agent will accept you and your manuscript for representation. You plan for the worst and hope for the best. This means you write the best piece you can and send it off. Then you start on another one.

In life, try to do the same thing. Do the best job possible, hope you get that raise, but plan as if you won't. Don't worry about whether the money will come through. If you've done the best you're capable of doing, the decision on the raise is out of your hands.

To worry or not to worry, that is the question.

What about you? Are you a worrier?