Celebrating Failure

One of the most defining moments in this class for me was the "Free Money" exercise. Even though it was several weeks ago I still remember it as if it was yesterday. Walking around the Dollar Tree trying to determine who I was going to offer the dollar bill to was one of the most awkward experiences I have had. I must have walked around for 5-10 minutes just trying to find a person to approach with the task. I finally mustered up the courage to walk up to this nice looking older lady and offered her the dollar for free and she gave me one of the strangest looks. You could read the confusion and suspicion on her face and she simply looked at me and said no and just walked away. I remember just feeling my confidence level tank and I questioned trying to complete the exercise. Luckily I didn't give up regardless of the cold responses I received because the last two people I approached were worth the embarrassment and self esteem blows I had taken earlier. I was able to give away $2 to two young kids who were able to use that money in the toy section and buy something they really wanted.

Through this experience I definitely had a lesson in perseverance. Regardless of the previous failures I experienced being able to make two little kids day was well worth it to me. Adapting and changing my game plan during the exercise allowed me to become successful in terms of giving the dollar away and not giving up. It would have been easy to just not even try the exercise or give up after the first no but I kept it at. Not everything we do becomes an instant success the first time sometimes the lessons we learn through failure are far greater than the success in and of itself.

People can look at failure from one of two lenses, the first lens being defeat. Defeat can seem to be the end of the world to some people and defines who they are as a person. This would be the negative way to look at failure, instead the other lens looks at failure as a learning experience. Seeing failure as a tool to learn from and better oneself for the future is a productive way to view failure. I think one moment I will always remember is sitting in my seventh grade history class and a poster next the board said "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take" - Wayne Gretzky. As a basketball player I sat there and really thought about that for a moment. If you don't try then you will never know if you will make or miss your shot, therefore by default you will miss it. At least by trying you give yourself a chance and regardless of whether you make it or not you had better odds than when you didn't shoot at all and you can take something away from the experience.

This class has definitely pushed me out of my comfort zone in more ways than one and I am grateful for the skills I have gained along the way. This class really proved my theory that if you don't at least give an effort than you will for sure fail. If you try than you still might fail but the risk of succeeding is worth the risk in and of itself.