Things happen for a reason

“Things happen for a reason” is probably one of the most grinding things to hear when something bad has happened to us.  It’s actually true though.  If it’s an illness, the reason might be exposure to a virus or a genetic mutation.  If we lost our job, the reason might be corporate earning plummeted or you stole from the company.

However, the empathic person is not stating the obvious that everything has a cause.  Rather, they are indicating that this event happened for some reason in the future that is yet unknown.  Often this statement has an ethereal, connection to the universe connotation.  The apparent insight that this person has to our awesome future, when we feel terrible, is what drives us nuts.

A brief survey (5) indicates that most (5) people don’t really believe there’s a superorder overseeing life’s events to take one thing away so that another more awesome thing can come along.  So why do we hang onto this statement?

It’s because in retrospect it looks like it did happen for a reason.  Being the resilient, positive people we are, we take a bad event and we get through it to another place.  If that place is not so bad or even better. If we learn something along the way or go off in a new direction and are successful, we might say–if I hadn’t lost my job, I would have never followed my passion in music.  The reason I lost my job was to get into music doesn’t make much sense.

Although my point is made, I want to note that not everyone gets through to a better place.  Sometimes what’s on the other side is lousy.  Then this statement is really off base.  Try, I am sorry to hear that.  How can I help you right now?