"Potential" is a four-letter word
Or, how I'm learning to live in the moment
Welcome to can’t relate, a newsletter from me, Maria Del Russo, that I write biweekly on Fridays. If you like what you’ve read, consider subscribing so you’ll be notified whenever I publish. If you want to submit a question for my upcoming agony aunt column, (coming end-of-year) you can do that here.
xxMDR
At least once a week, I get an inspirational text from my father. For as long as I can remember, he’s flooded our family group chat with YouTube videos espousing Greek philosophy, photos of advice from management books he reads, and quotes from Byron Katie’s podcast.
To be honest, most of the time these sentiments don’t resonate with me. I’m someone who doesn’t love the generalized, prescriptive nature of most self-help. I’m more of a “park your ass in therapy and deal with your own problems” kind of gal. (Which, as I write this, sounds pretty fucking ironic, considering I use this newsletter to share my own ideas with all of you. Something to bring up during my next therapy session, I guess!)
But the other day, he sent me something that kind of knocked the breath out of my lungs:
“You can’t get over what has been until you give up what you thought it should have been. Many get lost in the potential of the past rather than the reality of it. Remember, what’s meant for you will never leave you. Don’t stay stuck wishing it should have stayed or unfolded differently. Sometimes your temporary dreams must be released to reveal the magnitude of what you truly deserve.” **
Reading this wasn’t just a lightbulb moment. It was a floodlight moment. It was a we-just-turned-on-all-the-lights-in-Times-Square-at-once moment. This quote singularly boiled down the pain that I’ve been going through over the past few weeks — and, truthfully, probably my entire life.
Every time I experience an ending — a relationship, a job change, a death — or another less-than-ideal circumstance, I start in on the coulda, woulda, shoulda. This is especially true with relationships. As soon as one ends, my brain immediately discards the negative and transports itself to the beginning trills of new love. The promises, the vacations we planned, the fizzy feeling in your chest that just sitting next to the object of your infatuation produces. I get caught in the potential of the past, what could have been. And then I get stuck there, torturing myself with “if only” and “what if.” Never mind the fact that things turned toxic, or I couldn’t wait to escape. We were happy in the beginning, and then it failed, and I agonize over what could have been.
No wonder I have such a hard time living in the moment. I keep trying to backtrack my past to bring myself to a more perfect present. And then I wonder why I can’t just be happy with what I have. I’m living in a fantasy in my brain. Sheesh.
I read something once that I can’t find now, but it was an interview with a grief counselor. She spoke about how, when consoling parents who have lost a child, one thing always comes up: potential. The parents mourn what could have been for their child: a wedding, children of their own, traveling, Christmases, life. They’re mourning the potential of their children’s lives.
So how does she help them deal? She always reminds them that there is no alternate timeline where their children grow up and outlive them. There is no life that they are missing out on seeing for their children. Their children’s lives played out exactly how they were meant to because that is how it happened — no matter how painful the process.
At the time, I thought this was a little crass and dismissive. But now I see things differently. And while I’m not comparing my grief to the grief of losing a child, the more I think of it, the more I find comfort in this way of thinking.
Potential has the ability to blind us to reality. We’re constantly taught to not waste our potential. But what if potential doesn’t behave like that? What if potential is not a finite thing that we can manipulate, but instead, something intangible that does not actually exist, so we have no control over it? What if instead of looking back on potential as a regret, we look ahead toward it with excitement? How would that change the way we live?
So, this is my new project — not getting stuck. When I feel myself getting pulled back in the direction of what could have been, I try to reset my course for what is by journaling, stretching, or just thinking about something else. It’s not always easy, but even just trying to change my perspective has made me feel a lot less tortured.
It’s like my father always says: “There’s a reason a windshield is larger than a rearview mirror, Maria. It’s more important to look ahead than it is to look back.” I’m trying to remember that, and whatever other dad-isms seem to stick, as I navigate this moment of grief in my life.
xx MDR
This week’s trio
Three things that have made me happy recently:
In a twist of kismet, I’m currently reading Oona Out of Order, a sci-fi rom-com about a woman who lives her adult life out of order, jumping to random ages at midnight of her birthday every year. It’s funny, steamy, and a little too on-the-nose for what I’m working on in my own life at the moment.
This past weekend, I swung by the farmer’s market by Prospect Park and picked up the most gorgeous bouquet of basil that smelled ah-may-zing. It is now pesto, sitting in my freezer, waiting to be devoured all winter. (Probably sooner.)
I’ve never been able to keep up with a journaling habit because I always found it so restricting. But lately, I’ve been reaching for my notebook whenever I can’t work something out in my head. I make lists, I ramble, I scribble, and it makes me feel so much better. Once I let go of the idea of what it meant to be “good” at journaling, I found myself, well, much better at journaling. (This is the notebook I’m currently using, FYI.)
I went to a book reading last night at lower east side. It says "all of this people leaving our life only to make space for new blessings to come in" and I feel thats powerful and make goodbyes beautiful.
Ha! I thought I just invented the phrase "potential is a four letter word" so I googled it. (Do you mind if I take the title for my book?) Great post. Glad to find it almost 4 years later.