A few days ago, I stumbled across an old video of a professor teaching a deceptively simple lesson to his students.

He stood at the front of the classroom holding a glass of water. Nothing special — just a basic drinking glass, half full. He looked at his students and asked, “How heavy is this?”
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGTfEfVcMqA
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They tossed out guesses.
8 ounces.
12 ounces.
Maybe 16.

The professor shook his head gently.
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“The absolute weight of the glass doesn’t matter,” he said. “It depends on how long I hold it. If I hold it for a minute, nothing happens. If I hold it for an hour, my arm will start to ache. If I hold it all day, my arm will go numb and paralyze.”

He paused, letting the point sink in.

“The weight hasn’t changed. But the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes.”

The class leaned in, and he delivered the part I haven’t been able to stop thinking about:

“The stresses and worries of life are like this glass. Think about them briefly, and there’s no problem. Hold them longer, they begin to hurt. Hold them all day, and they’ll paralyze you. So remember — put the glass down.”
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That idea — the water glass effect — feels truer the older I get.
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Most of the burden we carry doesn’t come from the size of the problem itself, but from the time we spend gripping it. It’s not the weight of the argument that exhausts us; it’s replaying it again and again. It’s not the weight of the mistake; it’s revisiting it every time our mind drifts. It’s not the weight of the regret; it’s the rumination that traps us in place.
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Stress, fear, anxiety — they all grow heavier the longer we hold onto them. And the tighter we squeeze, the faster they accumulate weight.
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There’s a Buddhist story about a man struck by a poison arrow. A doctor rushes to help him, but before the arrow is removed, the man insists on knowing who shot it, what village he came from, what kind of wood the bow was made from. As he demands answers, the poison spreads — and kills him.
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It wasn’t the arrow that ended him.
It was his refusal to let go.

So take a moment today and ask yourself:
What glass are you still holding?
What thought, mistake, or worry has your arm trembling under its weight?
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Remember: the burden isn’t from what you’re holding — it’s from how long you’ve been holding it.
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Put the glass down.
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Key Takeaway: Most stress comes not from the weight of our worries, but from the time we spend gripping them. Release the glass, and you release the burden.

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