The Backwards Lens
How a contact lens put on the wrong way became a parable about the worries we build into mountains — and the simple fix we can't yet see.
Just picked up my new contact lenses from the doctor. When I was putting one on, I accidentally put it on backwards — the curvature was inverted. It felt like it wasn’t sitting right in my eye. I struggled with it, had no idea what was happening. Thought maybe this new contact just wasn’t working well.
Then I went to the doctor. He looked at it and said, “Oh, you put it on backwards.” He fixed it in seconds.
There’s a very specific kind of joy in that moment — when all the worry you’ve been building up just dissipates with a quick, easy solution. Minutes of struggle and mounting dread, dissolved by one obvious fix you simply couldn’t see.
So much of what we dread or worry about, so much of what doesn’t feel right, might have a solution that’s simpler than we could ever imagine.
We don’t know what we don’t know. And sometimes what we don’t know is the simple solution to something we’re making mountains out of molehills about — exaggerating with our own imagination.
Worth remembering this one.