Life is like a cup of Coffee

This post is an example of the content I share every Friday in my Living by Experience Magazine. If you’d like your free copy, click here.

This story has been shared many times in a few different versions – but, being the caffeine addict that I am, here’s my take on it.

A group of successful alumni, highly established in their careers, got together for reunion at one of their old university teacher’s home. As it usually goes, conversation soon turned into complaints about stress in work and life.

Offering his guests coffee, the teacher went to the kitchen and returned with a large pot of fresh coffee and an assortment of cups: porcelain, plastic, glass, some plain-looking and some expensive and exquisite. He told his students to help themselves to the coffee.

When all the students had a cup of coffee in hand, the teacher said: “If you noticed, all the nice-looking, expensive cups were gone first, leaving behind the plain and cheap ones. While it is normal for you to want only the best for yourselves, that is the source of your problems and stress. What all of you really wanted was coffee, not the cup. Still you consciously went for the better cups and are eyeing each other’s cups.”

“Now, if Life is coffee, then the jobs, money and position in society are the cups. They are just tools to hold and contain Life, but the quality of Life doesn’t change. Sometimes, by concentrating only on the cup, we fail to enjoy the coffee in it.”

Please, enjoy your coffee.

P.S. No pressure, but if this post helped you in any way, please consider buying me a coffee to keep me going. Thanks!