HEEDLESS
WORRIES

Topics: Appetites; Consequences; Danger; Decisions; Discernment; Eternal Death; Fear; Human Nature; Motivation; Priorities; Risk; Sinful Nature; Spiritual Direction; Temptation; Worry

References: Psalm 112:8; Matthew 6:25–27; 10:19

We all know the danger of risk. Yet we have a confounding habit of worrying about perceived dangers while ignoring real ones. Consider:

•     We agonized over the avian flu, which [as of December 2006] had killed no one in the United States. Yet we had to be cajoled into getting vaccinated for the common flu, which contributes to the deaths of 36,000 Americans each year.

•     White-knuckle fliers routinely choose to drive rather than fly when traveling long distances, heedless that a few hundred people die in U.S. commercial airline crashes in a year compared with 44,000 killed in motor vehicle wrecks.

•     We wring our hands over the mad cow pathogen that might be (but almost certainly isn’t) in our hamburger, yet we hardly worry about the cholesterol that contributes to the heart disease that annually kills 700,000 of us.

•     Shoppers still look askance at a bag of spinach for fear of E. coli bacteria while filling their carts with fat-sodden French fries and salt-crusted nachos.

•     We put filters on faucets, install air ionizers in our homes, and lather ourselves with antibacterial soap. At the same time, 20 percent of all adults smoke, nearly 20 percent of drivers and more than 30 percent of backseat passengers don’t use seat belts, and two-thirds of us are overweight or obese.

In short, shadowed by peril, you would think we would get pretty good at distinguishing the risks likeliest to do us in from the ones that are statistical long shots. But you would be wrong.

—Jeffrey Kluger, “Why We Worry about the Things We Shouldn’t,” Time (December 4, 2006)