Pronoia

In an in-depth conversation with a friend who is dealing with infidelity, the question of how to move forward was stumping her and of course, I could readily hand out advice since it is so much nicer to give than receive. Discover yourself, believe that nothing is going to change your world, set sail to destination me, I advised. Aren’t I pithy. Just as the world never knows what goes on behind closed doors, so does it not understand the inner workings of any one individual’s mind.

I asked a group of writers one time in a roundtable discussion in San Francisco what to do about impending joy? They looked at me as if I had landed from another planet. Yes, I said, I have nothing horrible to write about. I see they said as they shook their heads in pity. What no drama, no heart ache, no doom? But thankfully I was able to make up for that moment in spades with cataclysmic fates that would have weakened even the toughest out there.

Scrappy that I am, I am now back in balance. Not a teller of tales or creator of alternate fantasy worlds, I’m here, I’m me, and I’m frankly a little boring. Perhaps. In yoga, we talked about pronoia, the opposite of paranoia, that feeling that the world is conspiring to benefit people. This goes hand in and hand with my overarching theme of life – that life is what you make of it and the meaning of it is to live it – up and down and round and round.

Pronoia – it’s my word of the day.