Life is big.

That may sound obvious, but it’s worth repeating. Life is vast and complicated. It holds contradictions so massive that they can’t help but pull at the human mind. The world, taken as a whole, is a beautiful place—overflowing with wonder, creativity, and unexpected kindness. But it is also a brutal place—unjust, chaotic, and filled with suffering. Both things are true at the same time. And for a mind trying to make sense of it all, that’s not just confusing—it can be overwhelming.

This is where something like the Serenity Prayer becomes more than just a comforting phrase. It becomes a philosophy of survival. “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” That’s not just a prayer. It’s a compass for navigating the immensity of existence.

Because if you’re not careful—if you don’t know how to sort the changeable from the unchangeable—it’s far too easy to get pulled under. The horrors of the world, the injustices, the failures of systems and leaders and institutions—they are real. And for many people, they are constant. You don’t have to look hard to find reasons to despair. But if your identity, your happiness, your energy, becomes tied entirely to these vast, external things, then you risk losing not just hope—but your very will to live. Depression sets in. Numbness follows. Maybe worse.

But there is another path.

It is smaller. More humble. But no less important.

You shift your gaze to your own life. To your neighborhood. To your relationships. To the things you can change. You learn how to move through the world in a way that improves the lives around you, even if only slightly. You learn to be kind where you can, brave when it counts, and thoughtful even when it seems to go unnoticed. You take responsibility for your corner of reality.

That doesn’t mean you ignore the bigger picture. That’s its own kind of delusion. There are moments—there must be moments—where we speak up. Where we advocate. Where we push back against wrongs, even if we know we won’t live to see them righted. But we do this with open eyes. We understand the scale of the task. We accept that these issues are bigger than us—not to give up, but to preserve our balance.

Because this balancing act is delicate. Stay too focused on the global and you drown in helplessness. Stay too isolated in your personal sphere and you become indifferent. It is a tension that must be managed day by day.

And some days, let’s be honest, it’s all we can do just to get through.

When that happens—when life feels like a series of burdens to be endured rather than a reality to be lived—it’s worth taking that as a signal. Something is off. Maybe it’s your job. Maybe your relationship. Maybe your own mental health. Maybe your perspective has been hijacked by things far beyond your control, and you’ve forgotten the smaller levers of change that are still within your grasp.

If you’re just counting the hours until you can fall asleep or binge on distractions or go numb—that’s not laziness or weakness. That’s a warning light. Your system is telling you something: This isn’t sustainable.

And yet, we so often ignore it. We fear change. We fear uncertainty. We cling to the known discomfort rather than risk a different kind. But the longer we stay locked in patterns we could change, the more those small, avoidable discomforts begin to feel like an inescapable doom. The hopelessness grows, not because the world got worse, but because we stopped exercising what little agency we actually had.

So here’s the strange truth: Just as obsessing over global problems we can’t fix can crush our spirit, ignoring the small problems we can fix can do just as much damage. And the remedy isn’t some grand epiphany. It’s not some sudden burst of motivation. It’s a daily recalibration. A willingness to shift perspective. A reminder that even a tiny change, made in your own life, can restore your sense of balance.

No, there’s no perfect answer. No final solution that ties it all up in a neat bow.

But there is today. And there is something you can do with it.

And sometimes, that’s enough.