Looking back on life, it’s interesting to trace the origins of various habits, goals, and anxieties you’ve picked up from those around you and how they play out currently in your life. Sometimes it’s good to trace your development as a person and map your various traits to see how they have come together to make you, you.

One of the more pressing bits of anxiety I’ve picked up over time came from my group of friends in high school. My friends were the smart set: the AP/honors students, the chronic overachievers who had above 4.0 GPA’s, and who compared their college acceptances the way other students might compare trendy fashions or fantasy sports teams. You might think that I picked up a bit of status anxiety from being around these people, but you’d be wrong. What became the source of my tension was that they all seemed to have their lives so neatly planned out: what colleges they were going to attend, graduate schools to complete, and careers to pursue. Meanwhile, I just knew that I was going to college and my choice of major. That’s it. Nothing more. I think you can see where this is going.

As high school began to wane, my worries increased and I felt that I needed some sort of definitive plan. I would spiral out into cycles of anxiety at my lack of organization and my seeming unwillingness to organize my future. When I’d get into these funks, the best advice for coping with my struggles came from my father. His advice was plainly, “Just relax, it will all work itself out in the end.” At the time I was incredulous that the solution could be as simple as this and disregarded it as a possibility.

But now, looking back from the vantage point of a few years, I have to admit that he was right. In the end it did all work out; I’m going to an awesome school that is an almost perfect fit for me. I did not plan this, life simply opened up a possibility and I took it. That’s all there is. All that worrying and stress was for naught and now I feel ridiculous for believing otherwise.

I suppose I’ve become a convert to the idea that going with the flow of life, rather than trying to control where the flow goes, is the better course of action. Getting what you want in life is more a matter of knowing yourself and picking the direction you want to go, rather than laying out every specific step. Taking the circuitous route is more interesting and just as likely to get you where you want to go as the direct route, and if it doesn’t, it could take you someplace much better.

I often wonder where it is that my dad came to this view of life: whether it’s because his parents instilled it in him, his temperament brought it out in him, or because the course of his life made him realize it. Maybe it was some combination of the three. Considering that he went from being the son of a union machinist in Kansas City, Missouri to living his dream of being a successful screenwriter in Southern California, it was a path that served him well. And from the stories he’s told me, almost none of it was well planned.

However my dad came into this advice, it has served him well in life and I would be wise to remember it. Even applying it to my own life, I can testify to its power to shape it for the better. When the choice is between needless worrying or carving a better path in life, can it be any more obvious?