Some things in life are a given. A hundred different times, big and small, life has handed you lemons and sat on the front row to see what you do.
While at times you served up some sweet, fresh-squeezed lemonade, there were plenty of them when you didn’t.
Otherwise known as failure.
Something I, like you, am quite familiar with.
Some of these times, I cried and cursed. Some others, I moped. There were also times, if I’m being honest, I got angry and fantasized scenarios when I emerged gloriously victorious (while looking fabulous, of course), and with an expert flick of my wrist I pointed my sword and brought my enemies to their knees, weeping, defeated, begging for mercy.
But increasingly, I’ve pointed that sword at myself. Far be it from me to deny my own role in hitting myself on the knees, when I fell as a consequence of my own choices.
The pain, shame and guilt of certain events tends to stick around in our memory banks. We prefer to keep those vaults well-stocked for when we feel the urge to hold ourselves at emotional gunpoint.
Rarely do we take a moment to look if that failure, as painful and horrendous it might have been in the moment, was indeed a failure, or if it forced us to open our eyes and eventually led to something better.
My first break up? Shattering. Till I found love that was real and lasting.
That job that I was once desperate to get and validate myself? Well, turns out it taught me decisions based on fear don’t solve my problems, only shackle me to bigger ones.
Yes, at times the world is grossly unfair despite our best efforts. That is also a given.
But to fail is inevitable.
We are reluctant to accept failure, but even more reluctant to admit how some failures eventually freed us, from toxic friends, unhealthy relationships, awesome jobs that would’ve been awesome but it just wasn’t in the cards so instead we had to learn to get back up, adapt and make do with what we had.
Failure shakes us and wakes us up. Is there a better wake up call in life?
We’re human, and as such we forget what is good for us in the long-term while we’re busy chasing things in the short-term, things that merely sound or look good in our heads or to impress others.
And yet, when what seemed catastrophic then led us down a path we wouldn’t have otherwise chosen . . . it was something better, or more importantly, necessary.
If we paid attention, we’d find that so often failure brought us closer to the truth of who we are, giving us the opportunity to learn what we desperately needed to, so we could understand ourselves more, right our path, feel more joy, be more free.
Sometimes I cannot decide which I fear more, failure or freedom.
But then, if failure is the price of admission to be more free, I’m willing to pay it.
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