An acquaintance recently posted a quote (in the form of a dressed-up picture, of course), from someone named “Brian Tracy”, with whom I’m not familiar:

“Deal first with whatever is causing you the greatest emotional distress. Often this will break the logjam in your work and free you up mentally to complete other tasks.”

Seriously? To say nothing of the lack of eloquence in the quote itself (hardly deserving of such a decorated presentation), does anyone really think it’s so simple? Oh … just “deal” with it, he says. Does it really need to be said, that in many cases “whatever is causing the greatest emotional distress” is a chronic or intractable situation?

Oh, what an inspiring idea. I hadn’t thought of that. I’ll just “deal with it”, and this whole lifelong problem will be solved, and I can move onto the next thing. Brilliant.

From my perspective, whoever finds resonance in this directive has lived a very sheltered or privileged life, free of serious emotional turmoil rooted in significant, challenging life problems.