Get Ready to Fail

Think back to the days of school. Elementary, Junior High, High School, or College, doesn’t matter. Anytime when you were being taught and tested.  School is hard because it’s one of the few times in our lives in which we are willingly submitting to being judged. We go in with understanding, expecting, and in some cases hoping, that we will be evaluated.

 It’s an especially harsh situation when you consider the possibility of a harsh or sanctioning judgment. More than anything we fear FAILURE. The dreaded red “F” branded like a scarlet mark of shame on the term paper of our life. In the world of profanity, Failure is thought by many to be worse than……Fruit, Fructose, Friendly’s, Friday…..or any other words that also start with F.

The fear of F can trigger lots of thoughts:

What if I don’t do well?

What if I don’t know as much as I thought I did?

What if they think less of me?

What if I let somebody down? I don’t know what I’d do if I disappointed my teacher/parent/self/spouse/kids/dog/that-guy-at-the-grocery-store-I-always-run-into-don’t-know-his-name-but-he’s-always-so-noce-he-kinda-looks-like-my-grandpa?

What if I’m not as smart as I thought I was?

It’s an interesting reaction, and I think it is a good example of our tendency to work from a specific situation to a general conclusion. This is like inductive reasoning, going from specific observations to general conclusions. Many internet writers have slaved away bravely to help point out that Sherlock Holmes, who claims to be the hero of the deductive process, actually uses inductive reasoning to reach his conclusions. Keep it up internet sleuths. Our deerstalkers are off to you, and not just because you also pointed out that Sherlock Holmes didn't really wear a deerstalker. 

You lied to me

Unlike Sherlock Holmes, who is always correct about the chemical smudge on a sleeve revealing that the owner of said sleeve is a former Russian Cosmosnaut with a balloon fetish, we often arrive at an incorrect conclusion when it comes to our inductions about Failure. We conclude more often than not that a score of F should be interpreted as a Failure as a person. To put it in therapeutic terminology, we stop thinking that we Failed at the test (or project) and start thinking that we are a Failure. And we use that conclusion to fructose up our self-esteem.

Let me point out what I think Failure actually represents.

I Failed:

A test (or course, or project, etc)

In a certain school

On a certain day

In a certain subject

Within a certain subset of that subject

…………………………..

That’s ... it……

          I didn’t fail at life. I didn’t fail at being smart. I didn’t fail at being a human person. I simply failed at something. And failing at something Fridaying happens in life. It isn’t something that is avoidable, not completely.

                When we accept the label of Failure onto our own identity, we are giving far too much credit to the test, project, course, assignment, kangaroo boxing match, or whatever it was. And we are running a far greater risk.

I failed just by stepping into the ring

               

             When I was a student at Weber State University, I failed a course. It was a Criminal Justice course I took online during one of the busiest semesters of my life. I was overburdened and failing to do things in their proper order. Somehow I kidded myself that all would be well in the course, as long as I didn’t look at it too closely. This has always been a bad strategy, one that I have tried with my bank account as well.

                At semester’s end I logged into my student account, possibly for the first time, to view my grades. There it was all harsh and ugly, like a pool of blood in a snowy field:

F

                Come one people, why is it always red? It’s on a computer screen, you could make it look like whatever.

This was a blow to my identity. I have always been a good student, and receiving that grade made me feel somehow lesser. But it was a good experience overall. Thanks to a good support system and some introspection I found something useful in the experience. It probably didn’t hurt that I was always taking Psychology courses (seriously, if you want too much personal insight, become a counseling major).

                I learned that I tend to take on too much, get mixed up in my priorities, and become overwhelmed. And if I don’t manage that carefully then there is a cost to my performance. Luckily I have internalized that lesson now to the point where I never do it anymore. Just ask my wife, she’ll vouch for that.

                Nah, I’m just fruiting with you. I still do that.

                Learning this about myself didn’t change my nature, but it alerted me to an important blind spot in my personality, something I have to watch for as I plan out my life and decide which projects, plans, secret missions, or social engagements I accept. And without the cost, without paying the price of the F-word, I wouldn’t have learned the lesson.

                So now my challenge is to celebrate the reality of my Failures, to try and move quickly past the sting of the fresh bloody wound (seriously, why all the red?) and find the hidden lesson to help me find the path to a more pleasant, unfailing words, maybe even one beginning with an S.

                Like Saffron…

A Sheet of pristine and unique beauty. A work of art beyond the ability of human mind to invent or human hand to fashion. A glittering spectacle of the majesty of nature, fractal patterns forming spontaneously.

I destroy it in about 30 seconds.

I draw the plastic scraper up and down, about 8-10 passes should do it. The beauty is gone forever, never to be replicated on this earth. Sometimes I pass a large shovel up and down my driveway, scooping up irreplaceable objects unlike any ever before created, and throw them into the street.

I mean….off to the side of my mailbox. Don’t shovel snow into the street kids…

Don’t blame me; I’m late getting to the office.

I stopped the other day to consider the interesting relationship I have with snowflakes and ice crystals. I was preparing to leave home early in the morning, mindlessly going through the ritual of snowflake destruction, when I looked closely at the ice crystals of my car window. I don’t know if you’ve ever done this, but I is dazzling. Especially if you catch them in between the hard frozen stage and the time when they are still somewhat distinct from each other. They are wonderful.

This wasn’t the first time I’d done something like this. I like to watch my windshield while it is snowing, from inside the car. Whenever I stop at a red light I watch for individual snowflakes landing on the glass, and try to see the tiny little patterns, the icy little arms jutting off in every direction, before they melt gently into a drop of water.

I live in the Western part of the country, where we depend upon snowfall to supply us with water throughout the Spring and Summer. So in a way that droplet of water that the snowflake leaves behind is also beautiful. It’s a different kind of beauty, less immediately impressive but also more important. It’s like comparing the spectacle of diamonds to the comfort of food. They can both make you feel something.

My moment of clarity with my driver’s side window made me think about the many similar moments I probably miss every day. I missed the beauty of the snowflakes by being in a hurry and by worrying about things not happening in the current moment. If that’s all it takes to miss the beauty around me, I’m probably missing a lot.

Once something happens it’s gone. It won’t re-happen, at least not the same way. This is a great threat to every one of my generation and younger. We use a lot of time, energy, money, and technology to preserve the moments in our lives. And the results are often great. I love using Instagram as my journal of vacations. I love the fact that I can watch He Man, a cartoon from my youth, on Netflix right now. But sometimes we need to admit that the best moments are uncapturable.

Laughing and joking with my wife.

Playing a game with my daughter (she always says “Do you want to play a board game? It’s a perfect time to play a board game!).

Talking to my son (he’s 10 and loooooves to talk about stuff, very interested in the world).

A patient of mine who finally is ready to trust someone, chooses me.

Walking the dog.

Eating a great bacon and egg sandwich
(I was hungry when I wrote this and took a break to buy a bacon and egg sandwich).

       Christopher Morley wrote a book a long time ago called “The Haunted Bookshop,” in which Roger Mifflin, the proprietor of an old (but notably un-haunted) bookstore, explains how he learned to stop hating washing dishes. He recounts initial resistance to his wife’s insistence that the chore be his. Then he describes his attempts trying to rig up a stand in order to give him, the avid reader, a chance to read a book whilst washing. Then he happens upon an idea:

“While I soused and wallowed among pots and pans. I used to comfort myself with two lines of Keats:

'The moving waters at their priest-like task
Of pure ablution round earth's human shores——'

Then a new conception of the matter struck me. It is intolerable for a human being to go on doing any task as a penance, under duress. No matter what the work is, one must spiritualize it in some way, shatter the old idea of it into bits and rebuild it nearer to the heart's desire. How was I to do this with dish-washing?

"I broke a good many plates while I was pondering over the matter. Then it occurred to me that here was just the relaxation I needed. I had been worrying over the mental strain of being surrounded all day long by vociferous books, crying out at me their conflicting views as to the glories and agonies of life. Why not make dish-washing my balm and poultice?

"When one views a stubborn fact from a new angle, it is amazing how all its contours and edges change shape! Immediately my dishpan began to glow with a kind of philosophic halo! The warm, soapy water became a sovereign medicine to retract hot blood from the head; the homely act of washing and drying cups and saucers became a symbol of the order and cleanliness that man imposes on the unruly world about him. I tore down my book rack and reading lamp from over the sink.

                                                                                (Christopher Morley, The Haunted Bookshop, 1919)

               

                Probably the best description I have ever seen of what Psychologists call Cognitive Reframing, Morley’s use of changing perspective has stuck with me since reading it 5 or 6 years ago, and occasionally helps me to do some dishes.

                So watch for snowflakes and ice crystals, be aware of moments of joy and beauty. Or, more precisely, stop ignoring them. They are, after all, already there. Whether or not they matter is up to you and me.

By the way, patent pending on the word uncapturable………

testing

Dwight Hurst is listed at AllTherapist.com