Anything Could Happen (And You'll Cope)
Oliver Burkeman on anxiety. His take? It's dread about danger that doesn't exist right now.
Classic advice: imagine the worst, realize you'd survive. Problem is, sometimes bad things do happen. No amount of visualizing changes that.
His partner's realization: in movies, devastating news comes with ominous music. In real life, it just happens. Anything always could.
What helps? Not more planning. Action. Do small bits of the scary thing. Each time you learn something concrete: you coped.
Burkeman's line: "It's easier to act yourself into new ways of thinking than to think yourself into new ways of acting."
His track record of not being overwhelmed by existence suggests he never needed control to begin with.
Short read. Quietly powerful.
Anything Could Happen — by Oliver Burkeman