Aiyah, so close yet so far!

In life, we sometime miss out something by a little bit. For instance, I lost out to a good friend of mine to top a particular subject in secondary school. How much I lost? Well I lost to him by only 0.1 pts. He got 90.0 points and receive the top prize for that particular subject while I only score 89.9. I forgotten what is the prize anyway. So can you remember such a instance where you miss out by a bit?

Another great example would be buying lottery and you miss out by only one digit. For instance, if you bet on 1234 and the top prize turns out to be 1239. I am sure a lot of you would jump up and down, but the best thing is that you would jump even higher if the winning number turn out to be 1233 or 1235. Get the picture?

If you look at it carefully, every time you look at your 'close' encounter and lament that you miss it by just a little bit, you get fustrated, angry, sad and all the negative emotions. The higher the frequency of thought on the 'close' encounter, the more intense these negative emotions are and the more you make yourself feel lousy.

And if you look at the whole picture, you actually feel more lousy than someone who bought the number 1290. Haha, that guy will just say, "Oh well, buy again tomorrow! Someday I will strike." So he still feel good about it and the small ray of hope keeps him hopeful and feel better.

Whereas you who missed out by just a little says, "Why why, like that, why missed out by just a little bit!!!! WHY!!!?!?!?!??!?!" and the more you think about it, the more lousy you get.

So how do we make ourselve feel better if we do have such an encounter? Well first thing first, you must realise that miss by a millimetre is still missing from top spot. Miss by a metre is still missing the top spot. It is the past and cannot be changed anymore. Once you realise that such thing cannot be changed anymore, it is useless to think much about it. Because everytime YOU think about it, you make yourself lousy without having the chance or capability to change the fact that you miss it! Smart people should be able to see that it is a losing proposition and being rational human beings, especially if you are a Singaporean, you sure would not like to make a losing proposition right?

So don't focus your thoughts on the 'close' encounter, learn to let it go. Acknowledge that it is the past and there is no way you can change it and focus your thoughts on what you are doing in the present moment, do the best you can in what you are doing presently so at least when you look back next time (if there is a need) you will not regret because you are mindful that you done your best during that moment.

Cheers!