Failing Better

As 20-somethings, many of us are on a journey of expertise and becoming the best versions of ourselves. Becoming, as defined by Google’s dictionary, is the process of coming to be something. That means it’s a series of actions, and the culmination of these actions is how we achieve mastery. I believe that we all have what it takes to become our highest selves, but are we willing?

A few months ago after I experienced some personal loss, my friend bought me Scoubidou strings. If you’re a 90s kids, you might remember these plastic strings that we used to make keychains and the like. Anyway, my friend bought these for me as a means of distracting myself and healing my inner child. I was really excited because this is something that I had really loved to do growing up, but over a decade later the strings felt so foreign in my hands. I was a beginner again.

I decided to make a simple keychain design to begin. It took me hours. I was so frustrated the whole time because this was supposed to be easy, but it wasn’t. This was supposed to be healing and restorative, but these plastic strings were a pain.

I think this is how we start every new thing. Sometimes the skill comes easy or requires less effort from us, and other times it might be an uphill climb like me and my Scoubidou strings. Either way, how you start isn’t always how you finish. Or at least, it doesn’t have to be.

When I first started working out, I could not do one push up. I couldn’t even do one assisted push up. My arms would wobble underneath me and I wouldn’t be able to push my body back up to start without panting. I could have stopped there. I could have decided, maybe this push up thing is not for me. Maybe I’m not cut out for this. Maybe you’ve felt this way too? What I’ve learned since then is that we often overestimate the challenge and underestimate ourselves.

We have to be willing to fail, a lot, to succeed. We have to be willing to not be praised and sometimes be misunderstood. When I read stories like Fisayo’s, I’m reminded that success lies in our ability to be courageous enough to continue on.

Are you willing to fail enough times, no matter how long it takes?

Sometimes I ask myself this about my journey as a writer. Since starting this challenge I haven’t been looking at statistics of how many views I’m getting or who is reading this (unless you send me a direct message which I really appreciate) because I don’t want this to be a performance. This is my rehearsal.

Your new skill doesn’t have to have an end goal. You can decide to pick up a skill just because. Remember when we had hobbies just for fun? Allow yourself to explore and commit yourself to practice, thank me later.