The Obstacle Is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph

by Ryan Holiday

Whatever you’re going through, whatever is holding you down or standing in your way, can be turned into a source of strength—by thinking of people other than yourself. You won’t have time to think of your own suffering because there are other people suffering and you’re too focused on them. Pride can be broken. Toughness has its limits. But a desire to help? No harshness, no deprivation, no toil should interfere with our empathy toward others. Compassion is always an option. Camaraderie as well. That’s a power of the will that can never be taken away, only relinquished. Stop pretending that what you’re going through is somehow special or unfair. Whatever trouble you’re having—no matter how difficult—is not some unique misfortune picked out especially for you. It just is what it is. This kind of myopia is what convinces us, to our own detriment, that we’re the center of the universe. When really, there is a world beyond our own personal experience filled with people who have dealt with worse. We’re not special or unique simply by virtue of being. We’re all, at varying points in our lives, the subject of random and often incomprehensible events. Reminding ourselves of this is another way of being a bit more selfless.

I am not the center of the universe