10,000 NOs

CHAPTER 7Reframing

“Maybe that was a gift that my father gave me, from a young age I got burdened with so much. I hated him for a long time because of it. But now as I've gotten older, I use him a lot in my work. He is my darkness. He is a part that really completes me, as a person, as an artist.”

—Sarah Shahi, Actor (The L Word, Person of Interest)

The way in which we frame experiences and people throughout our lives is possibly the most important factor in determining not only our success, but also our happiness and peace of mind on this earth. If I had to pick just one lesson from this book that I'd like you to walk away with, it is probably this. Because all of us, whether we're a Navy SEAL, an Academy Award–winning actor, or atop the Forbes Fortune 500 List, will experience loss, tragedy, defeat, and emotional emptiness at some point in our lives. That is a given because all of us are human. What will differentiate us, however, and the quality of our lives, is how we choose to interpret those experiences and thus, how we respond to them.

It's Not the Canvas, It's What You See in the Canvas

I remember a time in elementary school when a black-and-white photocopy of a sketch was being passed around. When it was handed to someone for the first time, it was accompanied by the question, “What do you see?” Half the people would say it was a picture of an old lady. They'd point to her protruding chin and her bumped nose, her sad eyes looking downward, and the white kerchief ...