Exploring Happiness #54- Retreat From Fantasy Poem by June Stepansky

When did I stop feeling safe?
Was it my tonsillectomy
when I almost died?
Was it when I first realized
that planes could
fall from the sky?
Or was it
my first earthquake?

I stopped feeling safe,
I suppose,
when the fantasy
of invincibility
became the reality
of vulnerability!


From the day we are born, we become vulnerable to many dangers—cancer, heart disease, fire, earthquake, floods.
We don’t, however, think much about these problems as we continue to live our daily lives.
We now realize that terrorism is one more danger which we may be called upon to face in an already difficult and dangerous world.
Let us therefore live our lives with as much protection and courage as we possibly can, and let us also build into each day all the happiness, wisdom and dignity that will be necessary to sustain us in whatever challenges we may encounter in the future.


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The real test of a man is not how well he plays
the role he has invented for himself,
but how well be plays the role
that destiny has assigned him.
Jan Patocka

As soon as there is life
there is danger.
Ralph Waldo Emerson