My T-Shirt Says "Life is Good." Is it Really?

My favorite t-shirt is one of those “life is good” shirts that have become popular lately. It has a stick-figure guy reclining in an outdoor chair with a drink in his hand, and underneath that picture, it reads, “Life is Good.”

I usually wear it on vacation, during summer cookouts and spring crawfish boils, and any other time I specifically want to remind myself to relax and enjoy the moment. It’s one of those shirts that fits perfectly, and it’s a shade of green that nicely accentuates my dark skin.

It’s a great shirt.

I just can’t bring myself to wear it anymore.

I came across my shirt when I was packing for a short vacation this week. My initial, familiar instinct was to grab it and throw it in my travel bag like I always do when I travel. But then I remembered what it said and put it back in the drawer.

I haven’t felt right putting the shirt on since my brother was unexpectedly diagnosed with Stage 3 cancer a few months ago. I’m not sure if I actually agree with the shirt’s message anymore, and I don’t want to feel hypocritical.

Of course, I knew that young people got cancer before March and still felt fine wearing a shirt saying that life is good. So maybe I’m being even more hypocritical now by suddenly reversing course.

Or maybe wearing a “life is good” shirt was insulting to people battling serious, life-altering illness all along, and I’m just now sensitive to that.

I don’t know.

What I do know is that if I’m ever going to wear my favorite shirt again, I have to figure out whether I think life is actually good or not. So is it?

Life certainly can be good.

Life feels good when a hope is fulfilled or a goal is accomplished. It feels invigorating during time with soul-affirming family or friends, or a great meal, and even more so if the two things are combined. It feels meaningful during an insightful play or a time of spiritual reflection. Life is fun during a sporting event or vacation.

Life may feel good for a moment, but in the long run, life isn’t fair.

Illness and disease strike without warning or apparent cause. People who work hard don’t always
get what they worked for, through no fault of their own. We get no control over the genetics we inherit or the circumstances we were placed into from childhood, and these factors play a bigger role in shaping our destinies than perhaps anything else.

So how can life truly be good when some people seem to win its lottery while others seemingly are fated to become its garbage can?

The usual answer that optimistic people give is that even those of us who are down on our luck are probably taking 8,000 things for granted. That’s probably true. But it doesn’t explain why some people have 8,000 things to take for granted while others get 8 million.

Others say that life is what you make it. They say that if you choose humility, love and enthusiasm as your guides, then life will feel good even when it also feels really hard. If you dwell on the things you don’t have, you’ll miserable no matter how much you actually do.

I see that point. Still, life doesn’t feel all that good at the moment.

But I have the feeling that it will again someday.

Someday I’ll look back on all the times that God answered a prayer; or didn’t, and ultimately showed me the reason why.

Someday I’ll look back on the friends and family I encountered who brought more to my life than I possibly could have brought to theirs. I’ll be glad that I had them in my life for however long our paths crossed.

I’ll think back to those moments of pure joy where the world seemed to fall perfectly in line, to those times when I was saved by another’s unselfishness, to the occasions where I felt inspired by someone else’s dedication, imagination or example.

I’ll reflect on the joy of life’s best moments, what I learned from its worst, and I’ll be thankful that I managed to be around for however long God had in store for me on this Earth.

I’ll look back and realize that the joy of life’s best moments are one thousand times more powerful than gloom of its worst.

And you know what?

Life will suddenly feel pretty darn good.

Good enough that I might just pull out a certain t-shirt.