#fail well

The first day of finals. It was a Monday, and after a long semester of rehearsal after rehearsal and late nights trying to keep up with my coursework, I was excited to finally have the chance to eat breakfast with my floormates. So, right around 9:30am, with beautiful blue skies up ahead, we headed over to one of the dining halls to fuel up before hitting the books for the day.

Well, when in our conversation turned to the dates of our finals, one of my floormates recounted his schedule precisely, reciting the course, the weekday, the month, the date... the date… At that moment, instead of a mind ready to hit the books, I had a heart ready to hit the ground. Conscientious and thoughtful me was revealed as careless and thoughtless. I had one job and I blew it. That day, that morning, I missed a final exam.

Once my error was confirmed, my head felt free to spin and my eyes felt free to flood with tears. Why had I missed this? Why had no one told me? Why me? Why was I the one that failed? After the initial onslaught of emotions (and thanks to my father and my friends who were able to stave them off of a bit), I was able to take a deep breath and assess, to answer those questions and to think about my failure.

Years later, I’m able to reflect back on this out of school and in the workforce, where opportunities for failure don’t cease, but increase in number and in importance. So, what does does it mean to fail? And what does it mean to fail well?

First, fail, a verb, and as defined by my Google search means to (a) be unsuccessful in achieving one’s goal, or (b) neglect to do something. I… did both. So why had I missed it? Because I was (a) unsuccessful in achieving a goal, a simple goal, but a goal nonetheless, that is, of taking my exam when it was scheduled. AND to top it off, (b) I neglected to do something, that is, writing down my exam on the correct date, attending it.

So, I know you’re wondering. How did I turn these lemons into... less sour lemons? In what ways did I learn, and am still learning to fail well?

Well.. because ya girl loves Parks & Recreation and its matriarch, Leslie Knope, I followed her lead and made it into a helpful acrostic.

Find Faithful Friends Authenticity in Self-Assessment Investigate Solutions Lock It Down Write It Down Empathize Fully Listen Intently Love Wholeheartedly

Lean not on your own understanding

Find Faithful Friends: Building your circle of support is tantamount to moving well through failures. My failure revealed quite clearly that I didn’t really have people looking out for me in the class, though I thought I did. Maybe it’s because I wasn’t faithful to them in the ways they wanted me to. This one continues to be my weak spot. So don’t be uncertain about who is trustworthy, who is faithful.

Authenticity in Self-Assessment: Make it a point to assess yourself against the whole truth without the cushions of compliments or veils of validation. Ask yourself and others to objectively reveal what your shortcomings were. And don’t be afraid to be honest with those you’ve wronged in its wake.

Investigate Solutions: Rather than aimlessly pointing fingers as to who or what caused the problem, move purposely into the land of problem solving. Point fingers as to who or what can help solve the issue at hand.

Lock It Down: Practically, it means putting a system in place and into practice that will remind you of how to do things in a better way. The outcome is case-by-case, but the need is 100 out of 100.

Write It Down: As to not let history repeat itself, capture your failures as well as your successes. Don’t let memories fade and let failures instead be, as they say in the corporate world, “opportunities for growth…” (:

No one really helps those that help themselves

Empathize Fully: Empathy is not innate, it’s something you build. Every day is an opportunity to learn to “bear burdens” (Galatians 6:1-2) for your own idea of personal gain. So reach out and feel something other than what you think you should.

Listen Intently: Empathy’s foundation, good listening, is even harder to cultivate. Labor to be “quick to hear” and “slow to speak” (James 1:19-20) to keep your own emotional responses at bay.

Love Others Wholeheartedly: Though it may manifest itself positively or negatively, you already love yourself way too much. We are inherent selfish people, who look out for our own interests above others. Work to let your heart, your desires be focused on someone else.

As to not omit the full expression of myself, that is, my faith, my life as a Christian, one of the things I’ve learned the hard way is that it’s not all about me. It’s really not. I’m always drawn to the letter that the Apostle Paul writes to the Philippian church, in the words of second chapter that read,

“So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”*

Sometimes I naively wish the concept of altruism was enough for me to do these things. But it’s not, and it can’t be. Any marked progress in doing those last three things consistently is because I’m consistently “[encouraged] in Christ”. Mirroring the directives of His example, but even more, believing in the depths of His ultimate service through sacrifice, enables me to display such character to fellow believers and to others. Paul wrote these words while imprisoned! These thoughts really only scratch the surface. I’ve fallen in neglect and, much worse, in sin so many times that I’ve able to see this so clearly, but I ask you to learn this lesson sooner rather than later.

So. Back to the story. I know that you’d like me to say this had a “happy” ending. But, even better, I can say this had a real one. After talking to my professor, pleading with him to still let me take the exam, he relented, though with a (fitting) penalty - fifteen percent taken off my exam grade. I spent the next few days studying so hard to ensure that I was able to take that test with excellence. When that day came, I was prepared and passed with flying colors.

What did then did this teach me? That you have to experience great failures in order to be greatly successful on this earth? No. That I should learn to put my final exam dates in my calendars immediately after receiving the syllabus? No… well, yes, maybe that one. Most pointedly, this taught me about endurance. The truth of the matter is though we are not all guaranteed “success” here on this earth, we are all guaranteed to stumble, fall, and fail. Those who have endured are prepared to weather life and the tumult that it brings. To live life well is to fail well.

This blog post was adapted from my presentation at a demonstrative presentation forum at work, called Dumplings & Demos. So, uh, basically, I’m saying you should read this again while eating dumplings.