Like anyone, I have a lot of problems. I solve problems all day every day, mostly for work, but sometimes personal problems too. How to get insurance companies to pay claims. How to get people to attend my meetings. How to meet deadlines. I get really into my problems; there is all kinds of self-righteous chest-thumping that comes along with trying to get those problems solved. Over the past few months, I’ve realized some things about my problems that help them seem not so big (and on a good day, even kind of desirable).

1. As Sam Harris’s friend said to him, “Did you really think there would come a day when you had no problems?” Problems are a part of everyone’s life. If you’re lucky, your problems aren’t how you’ll get medicine for your dying child or how you’ll find clean drinking water in a drought after the town well went dry. We’re here to solve problems. 
2. Our little monkey brains love solving problems. It’s what we’ve been designed over 4 billion years of evolution to do – solving problems is one of the most powerful expressions of humanity there is. Solving problems can be downright satisfying – invigorating like sport. I get dragged kicking and screaming into my problems, but once I’ve solved them, I’m awash with lovely dopamine. 
3. Carl Sagan says that we are the universe knowing itself. We have evolved from the atoms of dust and gas floating around the universe, coalescing and exploding and reforming and drifting. And now we know how to solve problems – and we even solve problems like how to transport people through outer space. I am a single instance of life in the void of space – we are the only life we know of. And life is everywhere, causing and solving all kinds of problems. From trees turning sunlight into oxygen to bobcat moms feeding their bobcat babies, we are surrounded on all sides by an explosion of life. In light of this staggering miracle, my problems seem laughable. 
4. Your problems may be much different. My problems are deeply bougie problems. I’m not living in terror of being pulled out of my car and shot by police, or of being carpet bombed from above. Usually I’m figuring out whether to fire off a hostile email to the laziest person I work with shaming them for not meeting my deadlines. I am enormously fortunate that these are the problems I’m trying to solve. 
5. For 4 months, I was laid off work during COVID. I had few problems to solve. The main problem was how to fill the day, and that was a problem I did not like. On the tough days, my problem was how on earth I would get by in the event that I couldn’t return to my job, a job I love with my whole heart. The thought of not being able to solve the kinds of problems I solve in my work, maybe ever again, made me very, very sad. Also, being unemployed, along with 10% of the rest of the country, is a much worse problem than the Talent Adventure manager not answering my email. 
6. Again, your problems might be much more urgent, but literally no one’s dying because I can’t solve this problem. I am the only person suffering here, and my suffering is optional. 

I don’t always remember to apply these principles to my problems, at least not right away. But when I do, the relief is instantaneous. The relief is total. No matter how big the problem feels, this is okay. It’s more than okay, it’s glorious. For me, I’m still alive, against all odds, and against my own will. I have my family, and my pets, and all kinds of material comforts. I got through days I didn’t see as glorious, to have the glory revealed to me years later.

I like that these principles are grounded in a reality way outside of myself. It puts my worries into the context of a big wide world, and a view of humanity that is indisputably true, no matter how upsetting my racing thoughts are at the moment. These are facts, whether I accept them or not. When I accept these facts, it always helps me de-escalate. Not only does the de-escalation reduce my suffering, it even gives me the head space to be better at solving my problem. What a two-fer.