See how it was with those who came before,
how it will be with those who are living.

Like corn mortals ripen and fall;
like corn they come up again.


Katha Upanishad - Part 1, Verse 6
(Translated by Eknath Easwaran)
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I sat down at a chicken joint last night and in the booth beside me was a mother and daughter. The girl was high school aged, crying over something in pitch and tone that sounded like the end of the world, but in words and reality was quite trivial.

There’s a podcaster I like that says, “The worst thing that ever happened to you is the worst thing that ever happened to you.” It really clicked seeing these two generations side-by-side. Whatever some other girl said to the boy this girl liked was the worst thing ever. Meanwhile her mother, with four times the go-rounds on earth, has probably been through divorce settlements, health complications, financial woes, or a hundred other things that would put this high school drama to shame.

Fortunately for the daughter, the mother had the patience to sympathize with this social tragedy. I myself might have reached across the table to grab her shoulders and give her a good shake as I yell, “There are so many worse things coming down the line!” but that’s just me.

It’s amazing to look back a number of years that felt like yesterday, though, and realize that might’ve been the worst thing that ever happened to me too. Perhaps this mother could recognize herself in her daughter, going through the same cycle of trials she once went through before.

But life keeps pushing the threshold of “worst” further, making our tolerance higher. I’m sure in every painful situation we go through in life we wish it wasn’t happening. But if it didn’t, we’d be sitting across from our daughters crying over boys and they’d be reaching over a chicken sandwich to give us a violent shake.

That’s all for now, but I’ll leave you with this: Endure the trials of today knowing you’ll look back tomorrow and think they weren’t so bad.

Or maybe you will. As a friend’s dad once told us at an impressionable young age, “Life sucks and then you die.” So eat as many tasty sandwiches as you can between now and then because it’ll all be over soon.