This is Help Wanted, the show that makes your work work for you. I'm Jason Pfeiffer, editor-in-chief

of Entrepreneur Magazine. And I'm money expert Nicole Lapin. On Tuesdays, Jason and I answer the

helpline and help callers solve their work problems. And on Thursdays, I give you one way to improve your work and build a career or company you love.

And it starts now.

Hey there, HelpWanted listeners.

I just wrapped up a month of summer travel and I was reflecting as my travels ended on one of the strangest travel moments I've ever had,

because I realized it had happened exactly 20 years ago. And so it inspired today's episode.

Here we go. Someone wronged you. Maybe they insulted you, hurt you, ripped you off,

wounded your pride. Whatever it was,

you cannot let it go. You imagine them smug and successful, celebrating your pain, and you

seeth. Today, I will help you let go. To do it, I'm going to share a personal story from 20 years ago about a very

unexpected scam that I fell for. It taught me something profound about human nature that

changed how I think about the worst interactions I have. Because here's what I've learned.

Life is not an emotional zero-sum game. When people do you wrong,

they don't always gain anything. In fact, they might be hurting much more than you are.

So here's the story. In 2005, when I was 25, my family went on vacation to Australia. I gave myself a mission. I was going to

buy a didgeridoo, one of those long Aboriginal instruments. Near Cairns, that's where the Great

Barrier Reef is, or around there anyway. Near Cairns, I found a shop run by a guy named Richard.

He showed me a beautiful four-foot-long didgeridoo that I just loved.

But when I went to pay for it, Richard said that his credit card machine was broken. If I paid in

cash, he would give me 15% off. So I ran to an ATM and came back with $300, which was a lot of

money to me. Richard said that he would mail the didgeridoo to my

...