What If?
Two words control your entire life. Here's how to take them back.
What if?
Two words. That’s it. And they control everything.
Your anxiety. Your hope. Your future. Your present. The life you’re building or the life you’re avoiding.
Let me explain.
Anxiety Lives in “What If”
Anxiety, by definition, is fear of something fictitious that may happen in the future. We start building problems up in our minds that might take place. Problems that don’t exist yet. Problems that might never exist.
What if I can’t pay my bills this month?
What if I don’t get that job?
What if she doesn’t love me anymore?
What if I can’t lose this weight?
What if my dreams don’t come to fruition?
And here’s the thing: when those problems actually arrive? The anxiety is gone. You turn on your machine and handle it. Because that’s how we’re wired as humans.
The fear lives in the “what if.” Not in the reality.
But “What If” Works Both Ways
What if I just flipped the question?
What if these things did happen?
What if the opposite took place?
What if all my dreams came true?
What if I woke up today and forced a smile on my face?
What if I did five extra push-ups?
What if I ran three extra miles?
What if all the wild dreams in my heart actually came to fruition?
Just that simple switch is something we can all benefit from. All it takes is a reframe of two words.
You can change “What if” as it pertains to anxiety to “What if” as it pertains to optimism.
And what is optimism? Being hopeful about the future. Being hopeful about the present. Being hopeful.
Hope Is a Seed
In my experience, when I’ve invoked hope into my life, it doesn’t necessarily grow right away. But you notice in retrospect that hope breeds.
It really does.
Because optimism is a foundation. And hope is a seed you plant in that foundation. And anytime I’ve maintained some level of hope—even on a small scale—if I look back, all that hope actually grew into more hope. Into something I could touch, feel, smell, taste, and live.
For example:
I remember before I was a father, I always wondered, “What if I’m never going to be a father?” Well, the thing is, I am one now. And it is such a joy. I just drove my son to school this morning. I made him put his phone down, and I asked him what his lunch table was like, who sat at it, what they talked about, if they were all as silly as he was.
Being a father defined me. But I used to sit there and think, “What if I never get a chance to do that? What would my life look like?”
But what if it did? And it did.
I remember thinking, “What if I never get a chance to pay off my debt?” And guess what? I just did.
It was the hope that I planted—that these things would come to fruition—that ultimately arrived at the thing that did come to fruition.
And the same goes for anxiety. If you maintain the anxious “what if,” nothing truly ever happens.
Fear vs. Hope
Fear is anxiety. Hope is power.
They’re both kind of fictitious. You can’t necessarily touch those feelings or emotions. But you can definitely experience and touch what they grow or diminish into.
One can turn you toward depression, shame, and behaviors associated with those things.
One can turn you toward a future that is bright, filled with smiles, and truly is a cure for suffering.
The human condition is suffering. I’m not saying life is all suffering. But anxiety feeds it. Hope starves it.
So Why Not Lead With Hope?
Why not believe the fictitious thing that grows and materializes rather than the one that diminishes it?
This week, every time you catch yourself asking “What if” from a place of fear, flip it.
What if it worked out?
What if you already had what you needed?
What if hope was enough?
Try it. See what grows.
— Matt McManus
Co-founder, Gents Journey