Tom Papa - Youre Doing Great!: And Other Reasons to Stay Alive

Greetings!

Its good to see you again. I would like to start by thanking you for liking my first book enough, or at least buying enough of them, that my publisher called and asked if I would write another. This made me very happy, because not only do I like writing them but also it stops me from spending all my time baking bread, drinking red wine, and looking for cheeses. Not that I stopped any of those things to write this book, but its good to have something else to do.

I also knew exactly what I wanted to write about.

While it was really fun meeting everybody at my book events and shows over the past year, I have to admit that Im a little worried about you. You seem stressed, overworked, and, frankly, a little mixed up.

Everyone seems to be fighting this overwhelming feeling that things are getting worse, that we should be doing more, and that were not good enough. People are doing yoga at the airports, taking antidepressants by the handful, and drinking record amounts of alcohol, all in an attempt to not completely lose it.

Well, Im here to tell you that its time to calm down and realize that youre doing great! You really are. I see how hard you work and how much you care and Im telling you, youre doing great.

We are the first human beings to be inundated, twenty-four hours a day, with news, images, and ideas of all kinds devised by forces beyond our control, and its messing with our heads. They seep into our lives and are warping our perception of the world.

So while we arent dealing with a major war, we are at war for the control of our own thoughts. So lets recalibrate, turn off the devices, and open our eyes to a better reality. Youre doing great!

Ill go one betteryoure peaking right now. Seriously, if you have time in your life to sit and read this silly book, its not going to get much better. In the not-too-distant future people are going to ask you to go somewhere and youll have one question: Are there stairs? And if there are, youre not going. These are the good times.

Life isnt perfect. There have always been problems and there always will be. You can engage politically, you can fight for the things that you believe in, you can work really, really hard, but you shouldnt lose track of the fact that while were doing all that, life is flying by at lightning-fast speed. We live in an amazing time filled with airplanes, scooters, and peanut-butter cups. We have air conditioning, blenders, and martini shakers. Its time to refocus, enjoy it all, and realize that youre doing great.

Remember the fable about the ants and the grasshopper? All summer long the ants were working away preparing for the coming winter while the grasshopper was screwing around swimming and making out in the grass. Well, at the end of that story, winter takes hold and the ants all laugh from inside their warm homes as the grasshopper is outside freezing his unprepared hoppers off.

This tale isnt entirely accurate.

Theres nothing wrong with being a grasshopper, just dont be an arrogant grasshopper. Do your work, of course, but keep in mind that life is to be lived and theres nothing wrong with a dip in the pool once in a while. If you want to slow down, take the day off, and make love to another grasshopper, its okay to call in sick, put on a top hat, and have some fun.

Because the truth is, the end of the story for the ants and the grasshopper is exactly the same. But only one is going to die with a smile on their face.

So enjoy this book, enjoy some cheese, and better yet, enjoy your life.