In such a volatile environment, a single setback -- a grant that falls through or a snowstorm on a show date -- can upset the balance.
You are wrong to think that you will be more unhappy with a big single setback (a broken wrist, a broken heart) than with a lesser chronic one (a trick knee, a tense marriage).
Getting passed over for a promotion might induce unhappiness, but depression came from the irrational tendency to generalise from that single setback to an image of oneself as an all-round failure.
At his press conference, Mr. Bush gave a progress report on the war to date -- and found solid advances on every single front, without a single setback, not even a minor one, of any kind.
Adnani's demise, if confirmed, would be the biggest single setback to the leadership of ISIS since the group began its blitzkrieg across the Middle East, redrawing a century-old map in its wake.
Although she recently accepted a Disney gig set to make her the first black woman to direct a $100m movie, DuVernay understandably suspects that a single setback could see her career flounder in a way that a white, male counterpart's might not.
