Fried Worms on the Grill

Pretty much everything I know about human behavior comes down to worms and a hot skillet. If you drop a worm onto a skillet that's been placed half-atop a hot stove, with the other half resting on the countertop, you'll see what I mean pretty quickly.

Even before the skillet gets warms to the touch the worm, like magic, will start worming its way to the cool side. Because even worms know what feels good ... at least until the heat starts spreading and finally ruins Mr. Worm's day.

Human beings are all about pleasure-seeking and pain-avoidance, too. When life causes our personal skillets to start heating up around us it doesn't take much coaxing for most of us to start running away from the heat.

We prefer avoiding pain so much that we'll even deny that the skillet beneath us ever got hot in the first place, rather than admit we weren't always cool and in control all along.

Because we're smarter than worms (except maybe when it comes to emotional stuff, like relationships), our brains use the advantage of memory to point us toward the easiest direction to escape the heat. ... even though the immediacy of getting away from the heat is what we remember- instead of using what we've previously learned to avoid falling into somebody else's skillet in the first place.

Worms can't read self-help books or refer to appliance manuals when they need help: about all they can do is keep squirming away, from one cool spot to another ... at least until the heat warms the entire skillet. There's nothing to learn and no decisions to make about avoiding hot spots when it comes down to being a worm.

Because worms don't have the choice of asking for help and personal intervention from outside the skillet.