Sarah Harte: When positivity meets reality, sometimes you have to choose 

Gareth Sheridan: The origin story for his wealth and success is a familiar one of hard work, gumption, self-sacrifice, and a supportive partner willing to set off on the hero’s journey with him. It’s the primary narrative arc we are fed in American movies and self-help books. Picture: Gareth Chaney

Last week, I had to stay positive when several challenges presented themselves. As my own humdrum existence was unfolding, I followed Gareth Sheridan’s candidacy for the presidential election, watching him being buffeted by searching questions and probes. He is, by any metric, a positive person, a quality I generally admire.

The origin story for his wealth and success is a familiar one of hard work, gumption, self-sacrifice, and a supportive partner willing to set off on the hero’s journey with him. It’s the primary narrative arc we are fed in American movies and self-help books.

Sheridan seems like somebody who would live his life by positive nostrums extracted from those self-help business books. He is also only 35. He is now seeing the dark side of the bright side. Headlines like Sheridan plays down, Sheridan denies, Sheridan minimises links to… While the political arena is widely acknowledged to be gladiatorial, I don’t enjoy watching people being torn asunder. 

I imagine we have lost out on highly qualified presidential candidates because they smoked some dope in college or nicked some money from the collections box in the church when they were small, or took an ill-advised photo on a wild night out where they departed from their otherwise sane existence.

We have swapped places with America. Now, they can have presidents with limited personal morals and rap sheets as long as their arms, but here you have to be a paid-up shining beacon of puritanical morality with a flawless family, which used to be the case in America. 

We all have relatives we hope stay in the background. Some of us are luckier than others in this regard. A balance in what we ask of Irish presidential hopefuls would be positive.

Anyway, at the weekend I came across a quote in American writer and Pulitzer Prize finalist Adam Haslett’s new book Mothers and Sons. A character says, “There’s this myth that we’re endlessly elastic. It’s propaganda. Capitalist, patriarchal propaganda. Stay positive! Work hard! Find that extra little efficiency that lets you do more and more in less time... Because if you try hard enough, anything is possible, and we’re never going to die, so there’s always time. But there isn’t.” 

Blunt but true. Gareth Sheridan may be learning his hero’s journey is more complicated than he first conceived. When he graduates to a later stage, he may realise there is no hero’s journey.

There is hard work for sure. A modicum of intelligence helps. Even more helpful is a degree of self-knowledge; this one is harder to come by, especially for those with entrepreneurial drives. 

The very thing that drives them on can be the thing that prevents them from accepting defeat or even identifying or acknowledging their own personal weaknesses.

Putting a positive spin on everything does not get you through every situation and can be toxic. Those who do not learn this often go on to cause great destruction around them because this over-positivity derails a person’s ability to be in touch with reality, facts, and feelings appropriate to the given moment.

These characters' tragedy is that they are often talented in their way. But no amount of knockbacks can stop them from chugging on, and it often ends badly for anyone hapless enough to be in their path.

As I write this, an image of the Black Knight in Monty Python’s The Holy Grail flashes through my head. All his limbs hacked off by King Arthur, he threatens: "I'll bite your legs off."

Rational people are required sometimes to accept defeat, acknowledge regret, fold the tent and go home to lick their wounds.

When you’re at home reflecting on what you could have done differently, one comfort should be the fact there is no heroic journey. There is a limited degree of control over your destiny. Hard work, intelligence, strategy, and ambition play a part here. And then there is good and bad luck.

We don’t think about this too much because we’d go mad if we focused on the random nature of chance. We go around the place pretending things can’t change, like clicking our fingers. Safety is an illusion.

Three occasions last week required me to reflect on random bad news (hopefully this will come out the right way), random good luck in making it through an unexpected bad luck situation, and on the harsh reality of a persistent failing of mine.

Parking the first one, the random bad and good luck one was that I was eating a steak on Saturday night, when I, quite literally, nearly choked to death — such a simple thing. Eating too quickly (blame a brain that was stressed and speeding), eating a too-big bite of steak (blame greed), and the steak obstructed the larynx. I couldn’t breathe and staggered to my feet, wondering, Is this how it ends.

My random good luck came into play in that I was eating with a restaurateur who calmly got up and swiftly and effectively administered what used to be called the Heimlich manoeuvre. It is now called an abdominal thrust.

The steak (and other stuff, I’ll spare you) rocketed out of my mouth. I felt fortunate she was there, and she didn’t break my ribs (she’s very strong). Although what's a few broken ribs compared to the alternative?

Google Maps has its merits, particularly in the city, where it can be a Godsend, but it does mad things in rural Ireland, sending you down crazy routes.

What I also appreciated was that the people I was eating with didn’t put a ceaselessly positive spin on what happened when it wasn’t called for. It was a close shave, and like stunned mullets, we acknowledged the reality.

The reality of a personal lacking and where it leads me, never mind time wasting, came into play on the way back from Ennis to Cork, where I had been working. Basically, I have no sense of direction. I own it. There’s no sugar-coating this or saying, well, all things considered, you did pretty well. It’s like a chip is missing in my brain. This has led me down many long, winding roads, as it did last week.

I will say the multiple road closures across the country, with no alternative routes signalled (thanks), played their part. Google Maps has its merits, particularly in the city, where it can be a Godsend, but it does mad things in rural Ireland, sending you down crazy routes. The app needs to get a handle on this. We don’t want to drive down famine roads that are overgrown for centuries or cling to the side of cliffs.

When it happens, I try to stay positive. I begin thinking, “Ah, the Irish countryside is beautiful on this sunny day.” “You never drove through Broadford before.” “It was a chance to see Kanturk (three times).” This always wears off and leaves me feeling defeated. 

I face the fact that the odyssey will culminate in a late arrival home and barely suppressed mirth from family members and sly questions about what took me so long.

It’s called reality, and it’s always better to be acquainted with it, whatever the context, big or small, personal or even presidential. Positivity will only get you so far.