Harvard Business Publishing

One of the worst things you can do when the chips are down is feel sorry for yourself. This fact was brought home to me in an interview I heard with Dr. Dan Gottlieb on Fresh Air. A practicing psychologist, radio host, and successful author, Gottlieb has a warm demeanor and insightful guidance. He is also a quadriplegic as a result of car accident suffered some 29 years ago. Of late he has been plagued with some medical complications that are the long-term results of prolonged quadriplegia.

Host Terry Gross commented that there was an irony in the fact that his career was soaring but his body was "failing." Gottlieb corrected her. He did not regard his body as failing; it was simply wearing out. His body had served him well, far longer than might have been expected in an earlier age. That statement seemed to encapsulate Gottlieb's outlook on life. He takes care of his body as best he can, but some things are beyond his control. Yet he perseveres with his patients and in his work. No self-pity, simply self-awareness.

Another example, also via radio, brought home the need for facing facts. Leroy Sievers, an award winning journalist and cancer survivor, admitted on a recent commentary for NPR's Morning Edition that he felt that after many years the cancer may be getting the better of him. For years he has battled valiantly enduring rounds of treatments that often left him sick and depleted. He has bravely chronicled it for NPR listeners as well as readers of his blog. The admission was not self-pity; it was an affirmation of self-awareness.

Both men exemplify something that John Kennedy, himself no stranger to physical pain which he likely suffered everyday of his adult life, wrote: "The courage of life is often less a dramatic spectacle than the courage of a final moment; but it is no less a magnificent mixture of triumph and tragedy." What Kennedy wrote in Profiles in Courage, Gottleib and Sievers live. Like Kennedy, each faces life one day at a time. Each in his own way resolves to go forward.

It may seem a bit strained to equate the challenges faced by Gottleib and Sievers to the everyday hurdles we may face as managers in this difficult economy, but there are lessons we can draw from.

While market trends may be adversarial, dealing with them honestly and straightforwardly is essential. Wallowing in the pain of the moment does a disservice to your business, your team, and yourself. Should the worst come to pass for your company, you will live to do something else. It may not be easy but it can be done. It may take some guts. But, if nothing else, we can learn from people around us, be they facing disease and disability, or a personal crisis known only to themselves, that we can go forward.

Part of that survival can emerge from giving back to others. Gottlieb told Terry Gross that what made him happiest in life today was in giving away all the profits from his latest book, Letters to Sam. Fighting a declining bottom line may not encourage gift giving, but it may encourage you to give something back to your team, even if it is only a positive attitude.