Anything Considered

'These little things are great to little men.'

OLIVER GOLDSMITH, Irish playwright and poet (1728 - 1774)

Little things can frustrate me and weigh heavily on my mind. It is unsettling to know this, and more unsettling still to realise that my tiny troubles loom ever-large in spite of the knowledge that they dim in comparison to the afflictions of others.

I think I tend to want to victimise myself. I can't say whether this is a form of humility brought too far, or simply a sad narcissism. There is a constant sense of entrapment - whether by circumstances, prejudices or a careless series of mis-steps. And I know that this pervasive sense of victimhood has affected my quality of life.

In all adversity, there is doubt. I am all too familiar with constantly second-guessing my decisions, of being crippled by uncertainty, and of a malignant hopelessness.

Yet the strangest thing is that when we choose to break free and to fight on, we become liberated in spite of our circumstances. Perhaps freedom only empowers when we consciously decide to act upon the limited options that lie open to us. I know I derive meaning from the course of actions of my past - to some extent, what I do defines who I am.

'Isn't it the moment of most profound doubt that gives birth to new certainties? Perhaps hopelessness is the very soil that nourishes human hope; perhaps one could never find sense in life without first experiencing its absurdity.'

VACLAV HAVEL, playwright and 1st president of the Czech Republic (born 1936)

Hope is a strange thing.