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This is an ongoing list. You can think of it as Rachel’s Life Philosophy. I’m just writing it as a list now, but in time I hope to elaborate more on each point.

1. The secret to happiness is to have infinite flexibility with both the path and the goal.

This way, no obstacle causes anger or depression, because one can always find a different path or, if necessary, a variation on the goal. If, in fact, flexibility itself becomes the goal, then you have the added bonus of never seeing anything as second best. It’s always best to be flexible. And quite often, the paths we switch into and the goals to which we reorient ourselves lead us into far more rewarding lives than what we’d initially hoped for.

2. There is nothing that happens out of which good can not occur.

This is a paraphrase of something said by the mystic Emmanuel Swedenborg, and has helped me many times throughout my adult life. It acknowledges that bad things happen, but proposes that one can create good in the aftermath of misfortune, if one applies free will. This is a different way of seeing things than the oft-stated belief that everything happens for a reason. I actually think that many things do not happen for a reason — aside from the reason that caused them. For instance, the waitress was awake all night with a child who had diaper rash, which is why she spilled the coffee on your shirt. The coffee spill didn’t pick you specifically; you didn’t cause it. However, you can create good out of that problem, probably in ways you can’t see until you move forward.

I like this philosophy because it feels better than my thinking that there’s some plan causing the hardships in life, which can be debilitating and lead to a Why Me level of anguish. Instead, I can see that Bad Stuff Happens, and what matters is not the grand plan in which I’m an unthinking drone, but my own choices about how to deal with it.

3. Disappointment is a choice.

No one in the world has ever lived a life — or even one day of a life — where she or he has gotten everything that was expected, wanted, or hoped for. Thwarted plans are almost the rule, not the exception, in life. You can choose to view any unanticipated turn of events as punishment of some cruel cosmic force that has singled you out for misery, which means you are choosing anger, resentment, bitterness, or despondency. Or you can choose not to take it personally, realizing that no one’s plans work out exactly, despite how it might look from the outside, and that if you’re just flexible with the path and the goal, this surprise need not defeat you. Once you see that disappointment is a choice, you see that it is not a necessary response to Bad Stuff Happening. This frees you up to step away from the abyss that might otherwise tempt you to slide deep into despair. In turn, you can get going on making the good occur out of this surprise that has just happened.

4. When you don’t get what you want, mourn fast.

Let yourself feel sad, but don’t allow the sorrow to prevent you from continuing with applying your creativity toward both being flexible, and making the good occur.

5. Every path has many rewards and many challenges, whether you initially wanted or resisted that path.

We all want certain developments in our lives, and at times find ourselves at a moment when our futures could go down this road or that, but not both. (He will ask me out; the editor will buy the book; the job will be offered.) It is easy to think that our lives will suffer far more if fate doesn’t go as we hope. But whichever way things go, life will still go on: there will be unexpected difficulties, and unanticipated rewards. Thus, there are no right paths — there is only what we do when we’re on each path. When I realized this, it liberated me from linking my peace of mind to a specific progression in my life. So I might still want the job or the book deal, but know that I’ll also be okay if I don’t get them, because either way there will be things I’ll love about my life, and things I’ll have to work out.

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