What if Nothing Happens?

by Dee Ann Miller

"If nothing happen, nothing happens." That was the message in the window yesterday, as I walked by the busy counseling service in the old mall near my home.

I could almost hear sighs, thinking of some of the people I know who would say "How depressing!"

Personally, it makes lots of sense to me.

No matter how we long for change, we cannot possibly see change in everything we desire. At least not anytime soon. As I see it, in light of that statement, I have three choices:

(1) I can either accept that and say: "So, life has to go on, whether there's change or not."

(2) I can sit down and feel sorry for myself.

(3) Or, I can say: "If I don't do what my heart leads me to do, then what I want to see changed will never be. I have to try."

It seems to me that any of these choices can serve a purpose. Only the second choice is a sure recipe for total personal defeat, though.

If nothing happens, nothing happens. That's for sure!

So "Do not go where the path may lead, but go where there is no path and leave a trail." (Emerson)



Dee

Dee Ann Miller is the author of Enlarging Boston's Spotlight: A Call for Courage, Integrity, and Institutional Transformation (2017) How Little We Knew: Collusion and Confusion with Sexual Misconduct (1993) and The Truth about Malarkey (2000)