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Earlier this year, in the midst of my annual summer-break related free time, I read Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library – a book which, despite its apparent promise, had been collecting dust on my bookshelf since the previous December. The plot is fairly simple: after she attempts to end her life, a depressed, 30-something Nora Seed must relive and undo every decision she regrets. In her quest to recover the elusive “perfect life,” she realizes the value and possibilities of her life in her own reality. Indeed, following her life-altering ordeal, the main character opines that:
“It takes no effort to miss the friends we didn’t make and the work we didn’t do and the people we didn’t marry and the children we didn’t have. It is not difficult to see yourself through the lens of other people, and to wish you were all the different kaleidoscopic versions of you they wanted you to be… But it is not the lives we regret not living that are the real problem. It is the regret itself…”
Discerning readers of the McConnell Center blog likely could’ve anticipated this sort of conclusion immediately upon reading the book’s synopsis, and I too admit that, while the book boasts of beautiful prose and of an engaging plot, it’s not exactly subtle about what readers are supposed to learn by the end. It practically shouts at “Live in the moment!” from the first page. Still, something about the book seemed too endearing to really disparage, and I liked it despite its predictability.
The Midnight Library retained its place on my bookshelf after school restarted, though I hadn’t had much reason to revisit it during the rest of the summer. Recently though, I found my thoughts wandering back the story, and, particularly, to its musings on regret and perspective (“It is quite a revelation to discover that the place you wanted to escape to is the exact same place you escaped from. That the prison wasn’t the place, but the perspective.”). I’m not a particularly pessimistic or regretful person – at least, I try hard not to be – but I, like most, sometimes find myself allowing circumstances to dictate my attitude, rather than the other way around. Stress always seems to accompany this time of year; though I love fall, it often harbors an influx of responsibilities and assignments which always put a bit of a damper on things. This past week has been especially hectic – I urge you to consider, for a moment, a race in which the finish line keeps moving. Midweek, however, I began to consider the possibility that my own bad attitude (my perspective, if you will) functioned as more of a stressor than my actual situation.
I recognize the cliché in most of what I’ve just said – I am, in fact, starting to sound a bit like the conclusion of the book which I’ve just (gently) maligned. More importantly, though, I also recognize the truth of that thinking, and of the ultimate thinking of Nora Seed. Wishing away parts of our life because they’re busy, or stressful, or difficult, constrains the possibilities of those very same circumstances. Emphasizing the negative aspects of life only serves to make the overall experience more negative. These aren’t novel conclusions, nor are they particularly difficult to understand, but they are nonetheless difficult to apply. Regardless, I’d like to take up that challenge – and maybe also read the entirety of The Midnight Library again.