*As a belated 2015 New Years Resolution, I decided I would write a daily (or, almost daily, I know some days I just won’t be able to find the time) blog answering a thought provoking question from a long list of questions I found here in a quest of self exploration.
Today’s Chosen Question :
Which is worse, failing or never trying?
I have never really understood the intense fear of failing that some people have, other than being brainwashed/conditioned from birth that failing is the worst thing you can do and it makes you a worthless person. To go even further, I don’t even know why failing is associated with human worth in the first place, because personally, I admire people that try and persevere against all odds, regardless of whether they are “successful” or not (and success is in the eye of the beholder, success is simply achieving your goal or not and someone else’s goal may be different than yours would be going into the same thing).
Two people might walk into a class to take a final, and for one person, the class was very easy and for the other person understanding the material was a huge struggle. Person A might consider success as getting an A on the test and nothing less, and would consider getting a C a HUGE failure on their part, whereas person B might consider getting a C a huge success. So when you think about it, the ONLY person that has any merit in judging your failures or your successes – is YOU.
With that point made, lets go into the actual question. It is my personal view that never trying IS failure, and that you cannot fail if you try. If you try something and it doesn’t work out, thats all it means, that it doesn’t work out. BUT you have tried it and you KNOW it doesn’t work out, which makes it impossible, and as the famous quote goes, “When you eliminate the impossible, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truth.” Hence, the more things you fail at, the closer you are to your successes. So… isn’t failure a small success in itself, because you successfully eliminated something that you NEVER have to wonder about?
So in conclusion, I think you can never truly fail if you TRY, the essence of failure is always having that “what if” in the back of your mind and having to live with that for the rest of your life (and it will weigh on you and effect your choices, even if only on a subconscious level.) So screw fear of failure. If you want to do something, screw anyone else’s belief of whether you can be successful or not. TRY. Put your whole heart into it and listen to NO ONE. Things will either work out of they won’t, but if you know you gave it your all, you will never have to live with a “what if.” TRY, I say! Failure is not an option! 😉
Kell Frillman - Author 