With every passing year, the anniversary of 9/11 becomes more muted and less painful.

So it is and should be with excruciating memories.

Tragic events dot the lives of all of us – the death of a loved one, the end of a marriage, the loss of a home or business – and it’s sometimes difficult to resist the temptation to emotionally re-experience the heartache. It’s as if we must suffer again to prove we care.

But in the end, self-inflicted suffering is pointless and damaging. We are entitled to live happy lives, and that requires us to let go of the grief of terrible times. That doesn’t mean we forget them.

Regarding September 11th, it’s important to pause to honor with reverence and gratitude the victims and the noble efforts of those who struggled mightily to rescue them.

We should also reflect on four lessons worth remembering:

1. Life is fragile. We’re all vulnerable. We should live each day knowing it could be our last.

2. Every single life is precious. We should never diminish or demean the profound tragedy of lost lives by thinking of casualties in impersonal or statistical terms.

3. The capacity we saw to care about and cry for strangers proves we are not like the cold-hearted bigots who caused this calamity. We must never allow our anger or fear to turn us in that direction.

4. While we should defend ourselves, the fundamental principles that define our nation require us to be more humane, more just, and more forgiving than those who want to harm us.

This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.