Parshas Vayeitzei: Disappointments Are Good For You

There are times in life when things just don’t work out as planned. A job offer that looked promising disappears, a lucrative business deal falls through, or a possible shidduch for your daughter goes elsewhere. These events can be devestating, and tend to take away your will to keep on fighting.

We all know that everything Hashem does is for the good, but we have a hard time fully believing it. The thought creeps into your head, “Maybe I just am a loser.” What to do in such situations? How do you motivate yourself to keep on going, even after getting the hope knocked out of you so many times?

It’s hard to imagine, but those who suffer setbacks actually do better over the long run than those who have a smooth, easy life. In this week’s Parsha,  Yaakov who was running away for his life gets robbed of everything he owns by Elifaz. Instead of just throwing in the towel, he continues on to Lavan, gets married, has 12 children, and builds massive wealth. Would that had been possible if he would have just stayed at home and not gotten into this trouble in the first place?

It’s hard to figure out why we suffer setbacks, but we all do. However, these should be viewed as short term only, and in the long term they will turn out better for us.

A real life example of this is the stock of Altria Group, who used to be called Philip Morris. You’d think their stock would be a dismal performer, after being hit with massive lawsuits and government anti-smoking campaigns. However, over the past 30 years, their stock has beat many times over the S&P 500, and even over other safe & boring stocks such as Proctor & Gamble.

It may be more comfortable to have everything work out as planned, but in the long run, facing challenges and overcoming them outperforms the straight and easy by a lot.

Parshas Vayeitzei: Disappointments Are Good For You

Filed Under: Inspiration

Tags: altria group • challenges • disappointments • obstacles • philip morris