Letting the Good Be Good

I have a tendency to minimize the good things and I really wish I didn’t. Always waiting for the other shoe to drop in any situation, I have learned to expect the good to become bad. I never wanted to enjoy things while they lasted because I thought it would just make the bad harder. 

I remember the first time my therapist offered me a different perspective. She said: “the shoe will drop, enjoy this now!” This took my tendencies to avoid the good to protect myself from the bad and gave it some permission, permission to let the good be good even if it was just for a little while. 

While this has become easier and more natural through practice, the higher the stakes with the good thing, the harder it can become. Knowing I have everything I could imagine at my fingertips, I let the bad be bad: counting every way this could go wrong. I used to be classified as a pessimist disguised as an optimist, because I don’t think a bubbly personality is usually synonymous with seeing the glass half empty, but I don’t think it’s that simple. I think my diagnosed OCD has a major stake in this game, which makes it complicated. 

My OCD has come in many forms and “flavors”, but “pure O” or pure OCD is what is showing up here. Pure O describes a cycle of distressing thoughts and mental compulsions. 

My distressing thoughts around all things good going sour, have been covered up by the idea of beating it before the chase. If things go badly on my terms then it wouldn’t hurt as much. Or if I can’t have thoughts about good things or else they won’t come true. 

When I put this to paper, I feel like this inner dialogue is reminiscent of my childhood rituals. Needing to spin in circles before bed, counting, sharpening the same ten pencils at night to avoid failure, I have carried these OCD compulsions with me for so long—and that makes me sad. But it also inspires me to make a change. Let the good be good, because it is bound to get difficult again. There are no certainties in life but the idea that things will be difficult at some point again feels pretty certain.

So I would like to let the good be good and sit in it for a while, knowing the shoe will drop but it will also rise again.