Calm your mind today, by having faith in a brighter tomorrow.
I remember being in the hospital when I was a young girl, in excruciating pain with a horribly infected leg. Four days earlier, I had somehow managed to plunge a steak knife deep into the side of my right knee. I was 12 years old and hadn’t been concentrating on what I was doing, until I realized I had a knife sticking out of my leg. I yanked it out and screamed for my older sister to call an ambulance. She wrapped my leg with a tea towel-turned-tourniquet and called my mother at work to come take me to the hospital. There I had my wound bandaged up and was sent home.
The next day, my knee really started to hurt. I was limping around the house and complaining about the pain to my family, who assumed I was laying it on thick just to get attention. I was a 12-year-old with a wound that didn’t even require stitches, so it was a fairly reasonable assumption. However, it was incorrect. I wasn’t exaggerating and by the end of the third day, my knee had more than doubled in size. I was in so much pain I could not get out of bed, and by now it was very obvious that I wasn’t just vying for attention.
As I was unable to move without screaming in agony, my mom called an ambulance to take me to the hospital. The paramedics arrived, saw how much pain I was in, and suggested my mother just pack my knee in ice rather than try to move me. They assumed there wasn’t anything seriously wrong with my knee and all I required was some ice to bring down the swelling—another incorrect assumption. The next morning, after having been iced for the night, my knee was even worse, swelling to a size bigger than my head.
“This is ridiculous,” my stepfather said. “I’ll take you to the hospital myself.” While I cried in pain, he and my mom carried me down the stairs of our house and drove me back to the hospital. The admittance nurse took one look at me, rushed me into an examination room, and within a matter of minutes a swarm of doctors were hovering over my leg. I was relieved to be at the hospital, finally getting the attention I needed. I was sure I’d be fixed up in no time. Little did I know the doctor in the hall outside the examination room was telling my mom that my leg would likely have to be amputated. Amputation had never even crossed my mind. At the age of 12, I believed people went to the hospital to get better, not to get things cut off!
Thankfully, my mom was against idea and asked them to first do everything possible to save my leg. They agreed to treat it with intravenously administered antibiotics but warned they would only be able to use that course of action for a short time before running the risk of the infection spreading. An operation was also scheduled for the following day to drain some of the fluid from my knee and I was admitted to a hospital room. Even though the pain was unbearable, I took comfort knowing I would soon be better.
After a night of antibiotics, the swelling started to subside and the operation to drain my knee was postponed 24 hours. On the third day in the hospital, I was still unable to move my leg without a huge amount of pain but my knee was getting better. The doctors were astonished. The operation was postponed another day, then another, and another. A week later, without surgery, my knee had healed. I was released from the hospital and, with the help of crutches—and both of my legs—I hobbled home. A month later, I was running around as though the entire ordeal had never occurred. It was then that my mom explained just how close I had come to having my leg amputated.
This experience illustrates the value of challenging your assumptions. Incorrect assumptions almost cost me my leg. However, there is another equally important message and that is to have faith in happy endings. Happy endings happen all the time.
- A man with cancer hears from his doctor that the cancer is in remission.
- A woman who has had difficulty conceiving finds out she’s pregnant or adopts her first child.
- A teenager who has been told she would never walk again leaves her wheelchair and takes her first few steps.
- My own mother, who had been told her child’s leg might have to be amputated, believed in the possibility of happy endings when she asked the doctors to first do whatever they could to avoid amputation. One month later she watched that same child run around on two healthy legs.
When you find yourself smack dab in the middle of a worrisome situation, calm your mind by acknowledging that it’s just as possible that a happy ending can happen for you, too.
It’s important to understand that I’m not asking you to believe in a fairy-tale “happily ever after” ending, where the prince and princess spend the rest of their lives in uninterrupted harmony. We all know that in the real world, along with the triumphs, victories, joy, and bliss, we will experience obstacles, disappointments, sorrow, and heartache right up to the very end of our lives. It’s a necessary part of life. If we had all highs and no lows, we wouldn’t grow.
And unlike a fairy tale, your life is not just one long story. It’s a multitude of stories, each made up of many, many chapters and each chapter with its own beginning and end. During the difficult chapters of your life, I’m asking you to believe that a favorable outcome is possible. I’m suggesting you consider putting an end to your worry by having faith in happy endings instead of wasting your energy worrying about the worst possible outcome.
We waste far too much time worrying about things that never actually happen. That’s why we’re told: Don’t cross that bridge before you come to it. Having faith in happy endings will assist you in following this sage advice. Yet, what if you believe in a favorable outcome and end up with a not-so-happy ending? Would focusing on the best-case scenario have been a foolish waste of time? Not at all. Worrying wouldn’t have helped or changed the outcome. No amount of worrying will make tomorrow better. What you can do, however, is make today better by imagining the best for tomorrow.
When dealing with a difficult situation, challenge your assumptions, take action to control what you can control, and then let worry go. Every time I see the tiny scar on the side of my right knee or think of my mother’s powerful advocacy at the hospital, I know that happy endings are indeed possible. Have faith that a happy ending will happen for you.
