Chapter 12 Let the worries "stop here"

If we can draw a "stop here" boundary for all kinds of worries in life, we will find that life can be so happy. Have you ever wondered how to make money on Wall Street?Of course, I'm afraid there are at least 1 million people who want to know this.If I knew the answer to this question, the book would probably sell for $10,000 a copy.However, there is a good idea here, and many successful people have applied it.The story is told by Charles Roberts, an investment consultant. "When I first came to New York from Texas, I had only $20,000 on me, and my friend entrusted me to invest in the stock market. I thought I knew a lot about the stock market, but then I lost nothing. .Yes! I made some money in some business, but I lost it all.

"If I just lost all my money, I wouldn't care much. But I think it would be a very bad thing to lose all my friends' money, although they all have enough money. In our After my investment got such an unfortunate result, I was really afraid to see them again, but what I didn't expect was that they were not only very open about this matter, but also incredibly optimistic. "I began to study carefully the mistakes I had made. I made up my mind that before I entered the stock market again, I must first understand what the stock market is all about. So I found one of the most successful forecasters, Bo Don Cases, made friends with him. I believe I can learn a lot from him, because he has been a very successful man for many years, and I know that people who can make such a career, can't It's all about chance and luck.

"He first asked me a few questions about how I did it before. Then he told me one of the most important principles in stock trading. He said: 'Every stock I buy in the market has a So far, the minimum standard that can no longer be compensated. For example, I bought a stock that is $50 per share, and I immediately stipulate that the minimum standard that cannot be compensated is $45.' That is to say, in case the stock falls in price, it falls to When it is $5 lower than the buying price, sell it immediately. In this way, the loss can be limited to only $5. "'If you bought smartly,' continued the guru, 'your winnings could average $10, $25, or even $50. Therefore, after limiting your losses to $5, even if you More than half of the judgments are wrong, and you can make a lot of money.'

"I quickly learned this technique and have been using it ever since, saving my clients and me tens of thousands of dollars. "After a while, I discovered that this so-called 'stop here' principle can be applied outside of the stock market. I began to draw a 'stop here' on my worries outside of finances. ', I put a 'stop here' limit on every kind of annoyance and unpleasantness, and the result is fantastic. "Here's an example: I often have lunch with a friend who is very unpunctual. He used to arrive after most of my lunch time. Now I tell him: wait for you later' and stop here ' The limit is 10 minutes, and if you arrive after 10 minutes, our lunch will be over—you won't be able to find me."

I wish I had learned, many, many years ago, to apply this "stop here" limitation to everything about me—my impatience, my temper, my desire to adapt, my Regret and all the mental and emotional stress.Why didn't it occur to me before to catch every situation that might destroy my peace of mind?Why don't you say to yourself: "This matter is only worth worrying about so little - there is no need to worry about more..." Still, I feel like I'm not bad at at least one thing, and it was a serious situation - a crisis in my life - when I was almost watching my dreams, my plans for the future , and years of work put into practice.That's what happened:

In my early thirties, I decided to make a career out of writing fiction for life, to be a Franno, a Jack London, or a Hardy second.At that time, I was full of confidence and lived in Europe for two years. In the days after the end of the First World War, living in Europe with US dollars was very small.I spent two years there working on my creations.I titled that book The Big Snowstorm, which was a very good title, because the attitude of all the publishers to it was as cold as a whistling snowstorm.My heart almost stopped when my agent told me the work was worthless and that I didn't have the talent or talent to write fiction.

I left his office in a daze, no more surprised if he had hit me on the head with a stick, and I was stunned.I found myself at a crossroads in my life and had to make a very big decision.What should I do?In which direction should I turn?It was several weeks before I awoke from my daze.At the time, I had never heard the phrase "put a 'stop here' limit on your worries," but in retrospect, that's exactly what I did.I looked at the two years I spent painstakingly writing that novel as a valuable experience, and moved on from there.I went back to my old ways of organizing and teaching adult education classes, writing biographies and non-fiction in my spare time.

Am I glad I made this decision?Now whenever I think about that incident, I feel like dancing in the street with pride.I can honestly say that since then, I haven't had a day or an hour regretting not being second to Hardy. On a night 100 years ago, when a bird sang in the woods by Walden Pond, Thoreau dipped his quill in his homemade ink and wrote in his diary: "The price of a thing is I call it the total value of life, which needs to be exchanged on the spot, or paid at the end." Put it another way: we're the fools in the world if we pay for a part of our lives, and if we pay too much.This is the tragedy of Gilber and Sullivan: They know how to create happy lyrics and music, but they have absolutely no idea how to find happiness in life.They wrote many operettas that the world liked very much, but they could not control their temper.They once even quarreled for years over the price of a rug: Sullivan had bought a new rug for their theatre, but when Gilber saw the bill, he was very annoyed.This matter even went to court later, and the two of them never talked again until their death.

When Sullivan finished writing the music for the new opera, he sent it to Gilber; and Gilber, after filling in the lyrics, sent it back to Sullivan.At one point, they had to take the stage at the same time, so they stood on opposite sides of the stage, facing different directions and bowing so as not to see each other.They don't know how to set a minimum limit of "stop here" when conflicts and unhappiness arise, but Lincoln did this. During the American Civil War, when some of Lincoln's friends attacked some of his enemies, Lincoln said: "You feel more about personal grievances than I do. Maybe I feel too little. But I always thought it was very It's not worth it. There's really no need for a person to spend time arguing, and if someone doesn't attack me anymore, I won't hold his grudge."

I wish my Aunt Edith had Lincoln's generosity.She lives with her uncle Frank in a mortgaged farm.The soil quality there is very poor, and the irrigation conditions are also poor, so the harvest is naturally not good.Life was hard for them, and every penny had to be saved.But Aunt Edith liked to buy curtains and other trinkets to decorate her home, and she had bought them on credit from a small grocer in Maryville, Missouri.Uncle Frank was very worried that their debts could not be paid off, and he was a person who valued his personal reputation and was unwilling to go into debt, so he told the grocery store owner in private that his wife would not be allowed to buy his things on credit.

When she heard about it, she lost her temper—almost 50 years ago, and she was still losing her temper.I have heard her talk about it more than once.The last time I saw her, she was almost 80 years old.I said to her, "Aunt Edith, what Uncle Frank did was wrong, but don't you think that you've been complaining about it for almost half a century since it happened, isn't it worse than anything he's done?" ?" The price Aunt Edith paid for her unpleasant memories was too great—her own peace of mind. When Franklin was young, he also made a mistake that has been difficult to let go of for 70 years.When he was 7 years old, he fell in love with a whistle, so he excitedly ran into the toy store, put all his change on the counter, and bought the whistle without asking the price. "Then I came home," he wrote to his friends 70 years later, "and whistling all over the house, very proud of the whistle I bought." But when his brothers and sisters found him After overpaying for the whistle, everyone came to make fun of him.And as he said later: "I cried bitterly in annoyance." Many years later, Franklin became a world-renowned figure and served as the American ambassador to France.He also remembered that because he had paid more for the whistle, he had suffered more than the pleasure the whistle had given him. Franklin learned a very simple lesson from this lesson. "As I grew up," he said, "I saw a lot of human behavior, and I think I met a lot of people who paid too much for a whistle. In short, I think human suffering is partly Because they miscalculated the value of the thing, that is, they overpaid for the whistle." Gilbert and Sullivan overpaid for their whistles, as did my aunt Edith, and myself on many occasions.And the immortal Tolstoy, author of two of the world's greatest novels.According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, during the last 20 years of his life Tolstoy was "probably the most respected man in the whole world".In the 20 years before his death, people who admired him kept going to his house, hoping to see him, hear his voice, or even touch the hem of his clothes.Every word he said was wanted to be recorded in the notebook, just like it was a "sacred oracle".But in life, when Tolstoy was 70 years old, he was not as smart as Franklin was when he was 7 years old. He had no brains at all.Why do I say that? Here's why I say so about him: Tolstoy married a girl he really liked.In fact, they were so happy together that they would often get down on their knees and pray to God to allow them to continue living this fairy-tale life.However, the girl Tolstoy married was jealous by nature. She often dressed herself up as a country girl, spied on his movements everywhere, and even sneaked into the woods to spy on him.They had so many horrific fights that she was so jealous of her own daughter that she once shot a hole in her daughter's picture with a gun.She would roll about on the floor, hold a bottle of opium, and threaten suicide so frightened that her children huddled in a corner of the room, screaming and terrified. So what did Tolstoy do in the face of such a situation?If he went into a rage and smashed the furniture, I wouldn't blame him, because he had a reason for it.But what he did was far worse than that, and he kept it all in a private diary!In it, he blames his wife for everything - his "whistle".He wanted his next generation to forgive him, so he blamed his wife for all the mistakes.And what method did his wife use to deal with him?Is there even a question?Obviously, of course she tore up and burned his diary.She also kept a diary herself, blaming Tolstoy for all her mistakes.She even started writing a novel, titled "Whose Fault".In this novel, she portrays Tolstoy as a home-wrecker and herself as a distinct martyr. What is the result of all things?Why did these two men turn their only home into what Tolstoy called "a madhouse"?Obviously, there are several reasons for this, one of which is that they desperately want attention.It is true that what they worry most about is the opinions of others.Do we care who is to blame?No, we will only pay attention to our own problems, and will not waste a minute thinking about Tolstoy's private affairs.What a price these two boring people paid for their "whistle". 50 years of living in a horrible hell, just because neither of them was willing to say "stop arguing".Because neither person has enough value judgment to be able to say, "Let's get to the end of this right now, we're wasting our lives, let's just say 'enough' right now." Yes, I believe "having the right values" is one of the biggest secrets to mental peace.And I also believe that half of our worries can be quickly eliminated as long as we can set a personal standard-that is, what is worth comparing with our life. So, break the habit of worrying before it destroys you. Here's Rule #5: Whenever we want to pay for something that is not good compared to life, let us stop and ask ourselves the following three questions: 1. What is the relationship between the problem I am worried about and myself? 2. How do I set the minimum to "stop here" on something that worries me, and then forget about it altogether? 3. How much should I pay for this "whistle"?Have I paid more than it's worth?