On The Death Of Michael Crichton

Michael Crichton died today at the age of 66. Cancer.

He is best known as a writer of novels. Jurassic Park, Rising Sun, The Andromeda Strain and many more. He created the TV series “ER”. But the book I most enjoyed was a non-fiction work called simply “Travels”. It tells his stories of seeing the world and testing his limits along the way.

In fact, last night before learning of his death I was re-reading Travels and had just “dog-eared” a page that I thought could be the basis for a good post here or on Quixoting™. When I heard of his passing today, well, it just seems even more relevant.

As a back story, in this section of the book Crichton is telling the story of being at a preserve in Kenya. They were sleeping outside in a tent and had been reassured by the owners that no animals, certainly not an elephant, would get within their camp area. Not to worry, they said. Anyway, sure enough, an elephant is heard crashing around their tent – clearly not so worried about boundaries. His planned fear of the elephant turns to calm when he sees the large eye of the elephant with his flashlight:

“For a long time I felt it was because I am a practical person who, faced with an elephant outside his tent, examines all the possibilities — to runaway, to call for help, to scare the elephant off — and, having rejected them all, sensibly decides to go to sleep.

But later I realized that we are all like that. We all can work ourselves into a hysterical panic over possibilities that we won’t look at. What if I have cancer? What if my job is at risk? What if my kids are on drugs? What if I’m getting bald? What if an elephant is outside my tent?

What if I am faced with some terrible thing that I don’t know how to deal with?

And that hysteria always goes away the instant we are willing to hear the answer. Even if the answer is what we feared all along. Yes, you have cancer. Yes, your kids are on drugs. Yes, there is an elephant outside your tent.

Now the question becomes, What are you going to do about it? Subsequent emotions may not be pleasant, but the hysteria stops. Hysteria accompanies an unwillingness to look at what is really going on; it promotes an unwillingness to look. We feel we are afraid to look, when actually it is not-looking that makes us afraid. The minute we look, we cease being afraid.”

Since this blog is about job search and the psychology of being out of work, I thought this was a fairly compelling piece of writing. Some people do become deeply worried, some hysterical, at the thought of losing their job. If and when it happens, there can be a lot of stress placed on the life and lives affected.

So, to answer his question above, “What are you going to do about it?”.

Having read this blog before, you might say, build a proactive strategy. And you’d be right.

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