Often I ponder the difference between good days and bad days. Being someone who is somewhat melancholy by nature, I am aware of my own native tendency to painful degrees of reflection and self-criticism, which other people do not necessarily see (unless they happen to read this blog). Nevertheless, despite the fact that today was filled with a lot of odd questions and somewhat odd requests that I had to turn down, or at least strongly discourage based on the circumstances, I would not consider it a bad day. After all, I was able to have a relaxing afternoon full of reading, and was able to enjoy the company of coworkers while enjoying good food, and that always makes for a better day. Being a social eater, friendly company while eating is always something to be appreciated, and something that makes every day better. I am not hard to please, so it does not take a great deal to make it a good day. It struck me as unfortunate that I was hearing of many others having bad days today, when I found much to enjoy in it.
Not everyone, though, is even as prone to enjoy the pleasures of life as I am. I am often puzzled by what it is that leads people to judge a day as good or bad, or judge an event as good or bad. To be sure, there are things that happen that are pretty easy to judge, but not everything is so cut and dry. There may be things that seem unpleasant at first, but end up for the best, and other things that appear to be very enjoyable that, in retrospect, are not very much fun at all. Sometimes it is best to withhold initial judgment while one is gathering information, and at other times one has to shake one’s head at the way that appearances often belie realities. Yet far too often the chance for reversal, or at least of a reappraisal of something, is not done because spot judgments are made on superficial or initial appearances that nothing is later allowed to change. We are all worse off for that, because sometimes we do not have an accurate understanding of what is going on initially, and it takes some time for us to see what is going on, and for others to understand what is going on as well, so that people can act accordingly.
The tendency to seek judgments based on limited sample sizes is not limited to people alone. As some people may know, I happen to be an avid fan of the dwarf planet Pluto [1], and today some photos were released showing a single day on the planet. As it happens, a day on Pluto lasts about 6.4 days or so [2], making it a very long day, with the chance to be very good or very bad depending on one’s circumstances. Also of note is that because the center of gravity of Pluto and Charon are between the planet and its over-sized moon, the two orbit around each other in a particularly fixed way, similar to the way that the earth always views the same side of the moon. It is striking, though, that scientists wish to make conclusions about how a day on Pluto goes given that exactly one day on Pluto has been observed with any degree of depth, and even that only managed a partial look at the planet the satellite on fly-by. How do we know it was a typical day for Pluto? Was it a good day or a bad day? Given Pluto’s small size and extreme distance from earth, we may not be able to know what too many days on Pluto are like, but that will not stop us from using our very limited knowledge to guess and extrapolate.
Sometimes, though, even those matters much closer to us are almost as obscure as the day on far off and lonely Pluto. Sometimes we can only make judgments based on what we can see, and sometimes we simply are not being observant about the days of other people. For example, many of my coworkers take my generally restrained approach to matters, my friendliness to others, and assume that I have no bad days at all, which is certainly not the case, although I spend a lot of effort trying to find the good in days, or at least that which is noteworthy and can be written about and shared and reflected on and learned. There was a time, though, where for a period of several months I can remember one day where I smiled, and where the fact that I was in a dark gloom was all too obvious even to those who were not prone to being very observant, likely because the contrast was so great. As I am familiar with how such moods feel, and disinclined to put myself in a dark place by my own efforts, I take my chances on everyday. Every day begins as a new day with no mistakes yet, and though we do tend to bungle our way through life sometimes, at least we know that we can pick ourselves up and start again, if necessary, and the fact that one can find goodness once means it is there to be found again. Therefore let us hope and not despair, but let us also be compassionate when others are despairing.
[1] See, for example:
https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2015/07/16/searching-for-pluto/
https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2015/07/12/where-spaceships-go-to-die/
[2] http://www.nasa.gov/feature/a-day-on-pluto-a-day-on-charon/
Edge Induced Cohesion 