Maybe Life Is F-ing Simple

I was talking with a close family member recently who is struggling.

They don’t like their job. Money is tight. They don’t have much of a community or close friendships right now, and some family relationships aren’t what they wish they were.

Mostly, they just don’t seem very happy.

We were talking about money because that’s the worry that keeps coming up. How do I make more? How do I make ends meet? What am I going to do if this happens or that happens?

Those worries are real. You need money. Bills have to get paid.

But at some point, I found myself wondering if all the worrying about money was also doing something else.

Maybe it was keeping them busy.

Because if you’re constantly trying to solve the money problem, you don’t have to sit with the harder questions underneath it.

Do I like my life?

Why am I getting out of bed in the morning?

Where am I going?

Do I matter to anyone?

Those questions are a lot harder than figuring out how to pay the electric bill.

There’s something about having a problem to solve that gives us somewhere to put our energy. It can be easier to worry about money than to sit with loneliness, or lack of purpose, or the possibility that we’re not very happy with the life we’re living.

As we were talking, I remember thinking, God, life is fucking hard.

There’s so much to figure out.

And then, almost in the same breath, I thought:

Actually, maybe it isn’t.

Maybe life is fucking simple.

I work with a lot of people with cancer, and prognosis comes up all the time.

Someone will say, “My doctor told me half the people with my cancer die within two years.”

And I usually tell them there are two things I know for sure.

One, you are going to die.

And two, nobody has any idea when.

I’ve seen people who were supposed to have two years live for ten. I’ve seen people who expected ten get one.

There’s even a story about a man who made it to 114 and then got hit by a car. Imagine surviving 114 years of everything life can throw at you and that’s how you go.

We just don’t know.

There’s that old line: Do you know how to make God laugh? Tell him your plans.

Of course we make plans. We have to. But somewhere along the way, we start confusing having a plan with knowing what’s going to happen.

We worry about retirement. Our careers. Our kids. Whether we’re making the right choices. Whether we’re falling behind. Whether someday we’re finally going to get to the life we’re supposed to be living.

I do it too.

Maybe that’s part of what makes life feel so complicated. We’re not just living today. We’re trying to solve the entire thing.

And the entire thing is unsolvable.

I can’t know where my life is going. I can’t know how long I have. I can’t know what is going to happen to the people I love.

I can make plans. I can make good choices. I can take care of the things that need taking care of.

But I still don’t get to know.

And while I’m trying to figure out what my life is going to be, my life is already happening.

The other day I was walking into a casino, and there was a security guard standing near the entrance. I looked at him and he looked at me. Usually the guards look away or stay serious, but this guy smiled at me.

So I smiled back.

Then I walked over to him.

“Thanks for smiling at me,” I said. “That felt really good. I appreciate it.”

His smile got even bigger, and he reached out to give me a fist bump.

“Of course,” he said.

That was it. Maybe ten seconds.

But there was something about that moment. Two people who didn’t know each other saw each other.

For those ten seconds, nothing needed to be figured out. No problem needed to be solved.

Life was happening right there.

And I could have walked right past it.

I wonder how much of life is like that. How often we’re so busy thinking about what needs to happen next that we miss what’s happening now.

None of this makes the hard things disappear.

Money still matters. Loneliness hurts. Working at a job you hate can drain the life out of you. Wanting community and not having it is painful.

Maybe the shift isn’t to stop caring about those things.

Maybe it’s to stop believing we have to solve them before we’re allowed to live.

Because we can spend so much of our lives waiting.

Once I make enough money.

Once I find the right work.

Once I find my people.

Once I know what I’m doing.

Then I can relax. Then I can be happy. Then I can live.

Except this is the life.

This conversation. This ordinary day. This person sitting across from you. This stranger smiling at you at the entrance to a casino.

Life really is fucking hard sometimes.

But living it might be simpler than we make it.

Get out of bed. Try to live by what matters to you. Take care of the things that need taking care of.

And don’t get so busy trying to figure out your life that you miss the fact that you’re already in it.

I don’t know what my life is going to become either.

I’m just becoming a little less convinced that I need to know.