When you live to tell another day, you are prolonging your life. There are many people with huge egos who downright refuse to walk away from a fight. That’s not the right way to live. There’s more important things to do in life than that.
When Mark Cuban was first starting out with his business, his secretary stole ~$82k from him, approximately $225k today. He could have spent the next years of his life tracking down his secretary, taking time and attention away from his valuable business.
He had every right to do so. However, he didn’t do that. Instead of complaining about money, he forged on ahead with his business and lived to tell another day. He kept his eyes on the ball and kept working on his business. He is now a multi-billionaire today. The unimportant stuff didn’t phase him.
Rather, he focused on the important stuff that will get his business to the next level. That’s what mattered to him. He didn’t get care about the details and rather cared about the bigger things in his life that is a better calling for his time.
That’s the power of living to tell another day. When you live to tell another day, you aren’t letting your ego make your decision. Rather you are focusing on how to better your holistic life and not caring about what other people are getting at your expense.
That’s a much better way to live your life, over the long term.
Why You Should Live to Tell Another Day
The biggest reasons of why you should live to tell another day are listed below.
1) Life Lasts More than One Round
When people try to put everything in one fight and try to sacrifice everything and anything possible to win that fight, they are boiling their entire life onto a single round. That’s not the way to go. Life lasts more than one round over decades and decades.
When you live to tell another day, you are letting life do its thing and accepting that life is better when there’s multiple rounds to pick fights in. There’s no reason to bet everything chasing a goal that’s going to pay you five years from tomorrow. You have more important things to do.
Even if you have very right to pursue a fight, sometimes, it’s better to walk away from a fight rather than fight. Too many people let the wrong things consume their mental psyche. They could’ve been in such a better position for their future but they downright refuse to let the small things go.
That’s not right. There’s no reason to let a small inconvenience like road rage get in your way. There’s bigger fish to fry.
2) Life to Tell Another Day Because Others Depend on You
You have a family. There’s no point in laying everything on the line. There are people out there who downright refuse to let a couple of dollars go in a negotiation. Therefore, they argue with a store owner trying to fight over a couple of dollars and force their family to wait while they do so.
That’s not the right way to go. Yes, you might be correct when it comes to the principle. However, some things are worth more than saving that extra $5. There are other people who you are affecting by fighting for something that your family might not even want by the end.
Then it just becomes a matter of pride and ego. There are many things in life that are worth fighting for. Pride and ego definitely isn’t one of them. There’s no reason to risk and sacrifice everything to win in one shot if the win isn’t guaranteed.
It’s a good strategy to live to fight another day because you’ll still be in the game. Getting wiped out is not fun.
3) Zero is Better than Negative
When you risk and sacrifice everything and lose, then you are in the negative territory. When you recognize that you are playing at a disadvantage and you walk away from the battle, you are in a point of neutrality. Ground zero. Back to square one. That is a much better position to be in.
When you live to tell another day, you are returning to your baseline level of life before you faced the challenge, hardship, or fight. When you poured all your life savings in a business thinking that everything was going to work out and it didn’t and you walk away at the end, then that’s money that was well spent.
There’s no need to pour additional money into the venture and hoping that the “turnaround” will happen in the next couple of years. Every business comes with risk and there’s nothing wrong with failing and moving on to another venture that’ll make you the millions that you deserve.
Live to tell another day because the alternative of digging yourself a bigger hole isn’t the best strategy.
4) It’s Best to Prepare for the Worst and Have the Best Happen
Rather than preparing for the best and having the worst happen, it’s better to prepare for the worst and have the best happen. For example, there are many people in 2022 who took some risk off their investments. They didn’t care about maximizing gains.
They just cared about maximizing their safety because they had no idea what’s coming down the pike. Even in the historically lowest unemployment rate we’ve seen in multi-decades. that doesn’t mean that the worst still couldn’t happen. When you live to tell another day, you are preparing for the worst.
If the best happens, then you lose nothing. All you lost was the potential upside. However, you’re still in the game, still fighting on. However, if the worst happens after preparing for the best, you got wiped out. It’s not that easy to get back on your feet as others claim it to be.
The risk of getting wiped out of the fight is too enormous.
5) Walking Away May be Your Best Course of Action
I’m all for standing your ground. When someone tries to take away what’s yours, it’s time to stand your ground and take what is rightfully yours. However, that doesn’t always work out. Sometimes, it’s in your best interest to let it go. You have bigger fish to fry.
And more importantly, your time is worth more than anything else. When I first started out on my social media journey on Twitter, I met a lot of trolls who tried to take my messages down. Most of the trolls were no-name people with 100 followers whose opinions really didn’t matter that much.
After going through it for 2+ years, I can unequivocally say that walking away is the best course of action. I just let them be and don’t try to argue back. Saying “you’re right” just to end the argument is the best way to spend your time.
Or better yet, just walking away and not even responding to them in the first place is even better. Live to tell another day.
6) One Small “Loss” Isn’t the End of the World
You have to look at your life on a holistic basis instead of a detailed basis. One small “loss” isn’t the end of the world if you’re set to make millions afterwards. Life is long. You have plenty more chances later down the road to make things happen and make up for it.
Live to tell another day and let the subsequent days be even better than today. Life is not a zero-sum game where all you have is one chance to elevate your life. You have plenty more opportunities down the road because you’ll set yourself up for success that way.
Maybe someone stole $100 from you or you had a small disagreement in which you have to let the other side win for your own sanity. Whatever the case is, the little losses don’t matter on a holistic basis. When I got into a car accident, I needed to recoup 5 – 6 figures worth of losses.
THAT is a significant loss in which it’s worth fighting for. Everything else? Not so much.
7) The Best Defense is the Best Offense
A country never won a war by attacking all the time. Countries at war understand that sometimes you attack and sometimes, you have to defend. When you attack all the time, you attract many other enemies who will take advantage of that.
They know you will leave your home base unguarded and therefore attack you when you’re the most vulnerable. The best defense is the best offense. Live to tell another day because a successful defense matters more than you think they do.
The best investors in the 2022 bear market weren’t the ones who invested in aggressive growth stocks. They’re the ones who invested defensively and stockpiled cash when they had to. They lived to tell another day because maximizing gains aren’t as important as protecting yourself financially.
Defensive investing strategies made many millionaires. Just because they recognized when to walk away from a losing battle.
8) Live to Tell Another Day Because There are Better Positions Out There
The position you’re in right now may not be the best position to be in. When you try to win an uphill battle, you’re playing at a disadvantage. Why would you ever voluntarily play at a disadvantage? Now is the time to retreat and look for better spots later down the road.
Live to tell another day because positioning yourself for success is just as important as getting success yourself. And better days are definitely ahead. The ones who think it’s the end of the world or the end of their lives because they went through a bad breakup or a bad investment loss came out ahead eventually.
Your position and setup matters significantly. In tennis, you don’t try to win every single point by attacking all the time. You sometimes play boring shots in hopes of getting one that you can take full advantage of. Then once that opportunity comes, you finally pounce on it.
Patiently waiting to position and set yourself up for success is a winning strategy.
9) Your Time and Life is Worth More than Your Opponents
The ones who have nothing to lose are the scariest. They can invest all and everything they possibly can into their resources to attack you. They’re your worst nightmares because you may have something to lose. You may have a family to take care of or investment accounts to continue building.
Whenever I get into an argument on Twitter, I just walk away now. Not worth the mental aggravation to only come to the conclusion that we should “agree to disagree”. Your opponent just may not have that much to lose. Their lives are so mundane that they can spend unlimited amounts of time against you.
Therefore, live to tell another day. Recognize when your time, attention, and money is worth more than your opponent and fight accordingly. We have to let them win against us because we have much more in stake and more to lose than the other side. A dangerous spot to find yourself in.
Live to Tell Another Day
Live to tell another day because your life is a chess game that takes a long time to resolve. Today is not the end of the world. You have many more opportunities and chances down the road to play your game and win against other opponents. Sometimes, we are in a weak position.
We don’t try to muscle and force our way out of the weak position. We accept that we are in a weak position and look for better opportunities down the road. Whether we like it or not, we have to put our ego and pride aside in order to fight for better opportunities down the road.
When we’re young and have all the time in the world, we don’t mind spending it to protect our ego. The older we get, the less we care about our ego and pride. We have much more important things to protect and take care of at the end of the day. Our family, money, and time are some examples.
Live to tell another day because your future self will thank you for it. There’s no reason why you should go out on round 1. You have many more rounds to play and to win. Even if you think you’ll never get a better opportunity like the one you have in front of you.
A better one will come later down the road. How many breakups did we endure and think that this was the end of our love lives? How much money did we lose on our investments before we thought we would never make money ever again for the rest of our lives?
We always found a way to bounce back at the end of the day. Because that’s what we do.
Live to Tell Another Day: 9 Reasons Why Shortlist
- Life lasts more than one round
- Live to tell another day because others depend on you
- Zero is better than negative
- It’s best to prepare for the worst and have the best happen
- Walking away may be your best course of action
- One small “loss” isn’t the end of the world
- The best defense is the best offense
- Live to tell another day because there are better positions out there
- Your time and life is worth more than your opponents
This sentence is spot on: “Rather than preparing for the best and having the worst happen, it’s better to prepare for the worst and have the best happen. ”
Love it. Wonderful post.
Thank you, Nicole!! I always appreciate you stopping by. We should manage our risk very well.