Life Hacks on Planet Coronavirus: Get Rid of Self Pity

This will not only build general character, but it also gives you the freedom of moving on in life, and that, my friends, is the greatest (and sweetest) fruit of all.

Regardless of the ailment—death in family, divorce, loss of employment, or even testing positive for a disease that has no cure at the moment (believe it or not, but there’s a long list of them)—the quicker you contain the resulting pain, the quicker you can walk toward your next opportunity. The building blocks of life are challenges and opportunities—and yes, they are related because the more challenges you can rack up in life, the more opportunities you can create for yourself.

This brings us back to the act of moving on in life. The delay in moving on is kind of like missing one of those infrequently arriving local trains that are usually in the outskirts of large cities. If you miss one train, then you have to suffer through a grueling wait for the next train to arrive, which normally isn’t for a while. Life works similarly. Challenges and opportunities, like trains in the outskirts, are fleeting in nature so the quicker you can pull yourself together, the quicker you can jump on the next, train—preferably an express line—to your opportunity!

In closing, when I think about self pity, it always reminds me of the story Warren Buffett’s 96-year-old sidekick Charlie Munger used to recall during his talks. He would reference a friend who used to carry “anti-self-pity” cards (i.e. small business cards with a little note on side) in his pocket to hand out to highly successful and presumably wealthy people at fancy parties who would be swimming in a pool of self pity. The card in his pocket would read: “Your story has touched my heart; never have I heard of anyone with as many misfortunes as you.”