The Terror of Anticipation

Can we talk about Brigham Young ? No, not for religious purposes or even college football… but for the opportunity of sharing something that will give you access to freedom! In this quote I found this week, Brigham, who lived in the 19^th century, was speaking about a time when a judge stood up in a Mormon meeting and publicly insulted and threatened the group. Of this incident, he says (and I’ve added my own emphasis here):

“…there were men and women in the congregation who suffered more in the anticipation of what might be the result of it in future, than the generality this people have suffered in being actually mobbed.”

Do you ever do that? Do you ever imagine some terrible thing happening to you or those you love: bankruptcy, illness, divorce, misunderstandings, loss, loneliness, failure, or hardship? That’s what we’re talking about here. Find your own example of this.

He continues:

“…They could see, in imagination, all hell let loose upon us, themselves strung up, their ears cut off, their bowels torn out, and this whole people cut to pieces…”

Now look and see if you don’t do the same thing. Look at what images come to mind when you think about this thing you fear. Notice all the pictures that come to mind. What terrible places does your imagination take you? Living in a homeless shelter, being embarrassed, having to ask for help, being alone forever, never making ‘the cut’ and so on? Going on:

“After they had time to think, they found themselves still alive and unhurt, to their great astonishment. They suffered as much as though they had been sent to the bottom of the bottomless pit…I know this people have suffered more by the contemplation of trouble, than they have when actually passing through it…as they have magnified future trouble almost infinitely beyond its real dimensions…”

Isn’t that so true for all of us? See if you can locate a time in the past when you anticipated something unfavorable happening. Which was actually worse – anticipating it, or going through it? Maybe you thought “I could not handle it if…”; now notice that you did handle it – because here you are. Still alive.

And finally:

“…That mankind makes mistakes in these ways must be apparent to those who have felt the workings of hope and fear in their nature. People suffer more in the anticipation of death, than in death itself. There is more suffering in what I call borrowed trouble, than in trouble itself” (from Journal of Discourses, Vol 1, pages 313-315).

Amen, brother Brigham.