What if it is always everything and nothing?

‘Don’t cry over spilled milk.’

While the idiom reminds us not to get caught up in things that have happened that we cannot now control, if we never cried over spilled milk what would happen?

If we took that really literally it would probably mean that we would waste a lot more milk.

And if we always cried over spilled milk, what would happen? 

Again if we were really literal, we may never use milk for fear of spilling it.

Either case points to different and very literal extremes. Yet how often can a moment feel so important, that everything rests on it? 

How does this compare to the things that feel like nothing rests on them?

How do we approach both of these scenarios? How do we respond when the things that felt like everything turn out to be nothing and when the nothing is in fact everything?

What if we were to flip them? 

What would it be like to consider that what feels like everything is in fact nothing and what feels like nothing is actually everything? 

A useful thought experiment perhaps? 

A way to get a bit of distance and perspective from something. A chance to see what makes this everything or what makes this nothing to us and, with that distance, what it actually means for us.

Well, what if it is always both everything and nothing? 

For example, you get a great opportunity for you, the chance to fulfil or progress a big ambition of yours. It could be a last minute injury that means you’re now picked for a big match. It could be an introduction to someone who is really interested in your work, who you’ve been trying to speak to for a long time. It could be a promotion that has the chance to really advance your career. It could be a second date after a great first date. 

In these examples, in what ways could they be or feel like everything? 

That is that everything rests on them, that we cannot miss out on this opportunity.

Conversely, how could all these examples be nothing? 

The match goes well and the player you're covering recovers for the next one. The introduction is useful but nothing comes of it. The promotion is nothing like you expected. The second date is nothing like the novelty of the first one.

How could seeing moments and opportunities as both everything and nothing help us? 

If you knew that something you had coming up felt like everything was resting on it, how would it feel? 

If you knew that there is a chance that it could also be nothing, how could that help?

In an interview on the I Am podcast, Peter Crone, talked about a baseball player he worked with who hadn’t hit a homerun all season. Each game it felt harder and harder to hit that homerun, to ultimately do what he was meant to be good at. Peter asked the player what it would be like to know he would never hit a home run again, in exploring this, the player felt okay with that possibility. The next match he hit a home run. 

In performance fields it is often said ‘the key to winning is being prepared to lose’. 

The example alludes to what we can let go of to contemplate the thing that feels like everything could come to nothing, and in the example, that allowed the result, what we really want, to come more easily.

On the other hand, if that thing we thought could be everything comes to nothing, what would the impact be if you also knew that from nothing everything is still possible?

And if we felt like something was nothing, what would be different to consider that in fact it could also be everything? 

How might we prepare and respond knowing that nothing could become everything? Whether it is a chance interaction or we’re making dinner after a difficult day. What if we showed up thinking this could be everything, this could change everything? Maybe then the encounter blossoms into a long friendship or perhaps that dinner turns around a difficult day.

How we see things can often have a big impact on how we approach them, how they affect us and how we respond as a result. 

When things don’t go our way we may see that as a far larger sign than it may actually be.

While it could be the case that there are signs that say we need to change course, it may be we only see that in asking if this is really everything or is this in fact nothing?

If everything involves all things, then nothing is possible, and from nothing everything is possible. 

What would it be to consider how each moment may just be both everything and nothing?