Inspired

Putting a daily limit on self pity

Extract from "Tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom Pg 56, 57

I asked Morrie if he felt sorry for himself.

"Sometimes in the mornings," he said "Thats when I mourn. I feel around my body. I move my fingers and my hands - whatever I can still move -and I mourn what I've lost. I mourn the slow insidious way in which I'm dying. But then I stop mourning."

Just like that?

"I give myself a good cry  if I need it. But then I concentrate on all the good things still in my life. On the people who are coming to see me. On the stories I'm going to hear...Mitch, I don't allow myself any more self-pity than that. A little each morning, a few tears, and that's all."

I thought about all the people I knew who spent many of their waking hours feeling sorry for themselves. How useful it would be to put a daily limit on self pity. Just a few tearful minutes then on with the day. And if Morrie could do it with such a horribe disease . . .

"it's ony horrible if you see it that way." Morrie said. "It's horrible to watch my body slowly wilt away to nothing. But it's also wonderful becasue of all the time I get to say good bye."

He smiled, "Not everyone is so lucky."

I studied him in his chair, unable to stand to wash, to pull on his pants. Lucky? Did he really say lucky?