Don't Cry Over Spilt Milk

The phrase “don’t cry over spilt milk” has been around for generations and that’s because it should send a lifelong message to everyone who hears it. Obviously it’s not about spilling things on the floor and getting angry that you now have to clean up.

The best way I’ve heard it be explained was in Dale Carnegie’s book ‘How to Stop Worrying and Star Living’ in which he speaks of a science teacher Dr. Paul Brandwine who demonstrates a message to his class by sweeping a bottle of milk down and after it crashes he asks the class to gather around as he spoke “I want you to remember this lesson the rest of your lives. That milk is gone. You can see it down the drain; and all the fussing and hair-pulling in the world won’t bring back a drop of it. With a little thought and prevention, that milk might have been saved. But it’s too late now, all we can do is write it off, forget it, and go on to the next thing”

As humans we are constantly battling the thoughts of ‘I should have’ or ‘I shouldn’t have’ but doing that in no way benefits us as we can’t change what happened a second ago. Our battle should be to reduce the time spent dwelling in such moments. If we say to ourselves “it is so, it cannot be otherwise” we can start to break the habit of dwelling on events that cannot be changed and we can start to become more productive with our time.

As a day trader it is a very brutal lesson to learn because these moments hit you constantly and consistently! Everyday there is a move I’ve thought about making and have either waited to long or ended up not going through with it and then it booms and I curse myself. But for the last few months I’ve been training myself to forget instantly so that I basically remove the words ‘I should have’ or ‘I shouldn’t have’ from my vocabulary. It’s allowed me to regain focus much quicker and get back to trading, in fact I have broken the habit in most aspects of my life. When something bad happens I find that I don’t dwell on it and it kind of just brushes over me to the point a lot of people have asked “aren’t you worried” about certain situations and my response is usually “no, it is what it is” and cannot be otherwise. If you could change things we all would but unfortunately in life we can’t.

The goal of this post is to try and make you aware of the time you spend dwelling on events that cannot be changed. Take a moment to consider how often and how long you waste precious time dwelling on something that is in the past that you should or shouldn’t have done. Now tell yourself today is the beginning of the end and from this point on you will be more conscious of to prevent it. How much more productive could you be in your day at work or at home if you learnt to stop worrying so much and turned that worry into something you enjoy.

Please also be aware that with these moments, before you move on, there is always a lesson to be learnt before you brush them aside. Learning from losses is a whole other discussion in itself. The focus here is to not get hung up on or dwell on these once the lesson is understood. And remember “it is so; and cannot be otherwise