"What is happening to my life?" said Dorothy, exhaustedly sipping a triple espresso across the table from me. "Did I do something to deserve this?"

By "this," Dorothy meant a series of crises that had recently hit her like a gang of meth-crazed prizefighters. Her husband had filed for divorce—a week after she lost her job, the same day she was diagnosed with diabetes. Then her best friend moved away. Now Dorothy was caring for both her aging parents while paying a divorce lawyer way more than she (or her retirement account) could afford. "I'm not sure I can go on," she told me. "Why is all this happening at once?"

"Well," I said, "according to probability theory, random events can run in streaks. It's like patterned disorder, and in nature it creates beautiful things."

Dorothy looked as though I'd poured mouse droppings into her coffee. "That's your explanation? My screwed-up life is just beautifully random?"

"It's the most rational explanation," I said. "It's not my explanation."

"What is?"

I shrugged. "I think you've hit a rumble strip."

Then I laid out for Dorothy what I'll now lay out for you, just in case your own current luck makes Job look like a lottery winner. I don't know why catastrophes sometimes come in clusters. But experience and observation have convinced me that these patches of awfulness may be purposeful and, in the end, benevolent. If you've had a run of horrible luck, you can tell yourself you're being tortured or punished. Or you can decide you're being steered.

Life Is a Highway


Imagine that your true self is your essential consciousness, the part of you that still feels what it was like to be you ten years ago, even though most of the atoms in your physical body have been replaced since then. Suppose you set out to experience the adventure of human life by inhabiting your body. And that this essential you sees your life as an epic road trip. Destination: inner wisdom, love, and joy.

Now let's suppose you forgot this destiny at birth. In its place you created a mental map of the life route you preferred—passing through good health, perfect romance, and professional success on the way to a cheery, painless death (say, being struck by a meteorite while bicycling at the age of 110).

Unfortunately, your essential self very probably has in mind a stranger and more exciting road, featuring spooky tunnels, scary precipices, and sharp curves. Which means your destiny isn't at all what you think you want. Which means that as you drive along the road of life, there will be times when your essential self plans to turn even though you most certainly do not.

Next: Understanding life's "rumble strips"

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