I was talking to someone about my early business failures and
mentioned that my mistakes cost me a little more than $100,000 and
that it had taken me quite a few years to dig myself back out from that.
My companioned exclaimed "That's nothing, dude: I lost more than
half a million!"

I expressed surprise and shock. "Wow - how did you manage to
get out from under?", I asked.

"What do you mean?"

What do I mean? I mean how did you get back to solvency after
such a horrible loss? I've known other peple who have suffered
like that and some of them never did recover - my hundred thou
was pretty tough, but five times that or more is unthinkable, at
least for me - it would take me fifty years to climb out of a hole like
that!. I wondered how he had built himself back up.

"Well, I mean that if XXX hadn't screwed me on the deal, I would
have been able to sell my share of the business for half a mill. Thanks
to his lawyers, I got thirty thou."

Ahh.. slight difference there. You see, I actually LOST money.
I went into debt. I OWED money. I had to pay it back, drop by
painful drop. My companion simply got less than he thought he
deserved. That's not the same thing at all.

I was reminded of that when someone else complained about losing
money on an investment. The stocks had been riding high, but took a recent
tumble. He'd "lost" money.. or so he said. But in fact the stock was
still worth far more than he had paid for it, so really he hadn't lost
anything - in fact he'd done pretty darn well. Again, that's not
a loss.

I certainly understand that it's disappointing to get less than you
expected. I've experienced that myself, but I don't think of those
as losses. Real losses hurt, they don't just disappoint. And they can
keep on hurting for years.

I did crawl my way back. Those days are far behind me now. But
I sure do remember what it felt like, and never want to be there again.

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