I will say in some cases I do have a fear of failure. It's not constantly on my mind, but it does play a role in my thought processes. When I was growing up, I would always try my best at many different things, but in the end I would fail more times than I succeed. It didn't matter if it was sports, video games, tests in school, and of course...girls; I was a failure. As I've stated in previous blog pieces, every time I failed, I would always wonder what was wrong with me. Granted, my having Asperger's had little to do with certain events or competition because that was strictly physical, rather than social settings or mental tests.
Thinking I fail all the time is a little silly because I didn't fail all the time. If I failed, I wouldn't have a college degree, a wife and a family so in many ways I did succeed. I guess we all have a tendency to look at only what we didn't do versus what we were able to accomplish. In sports, most of my teams either won or we would come in second; and that goes for playing or coaching. In some cases, I believe there are varying degrees of what we see as failure. To my daughters, any grade other than an "A" is seen as a failure. There's nothing wrong with a "B" or "C", but to them it's not acceptable.
Honestly, it doesn't affect me as much now as it did when I was younger. I guess because I tried so hard to have friends and I was willing to do anything to gain their approval. I remember cheating on my spelling tests in 5th grade because I was tired of failing the tests all the time...I did get caught...it wasn't pretty. I felt like I had to cut corners just to get ahead so I would lower my failure rate. I think many times it was becoming too much of a burden to bear; so much that I would quit doing some things just because I was tired of failing or the potential to fail.
I guess today, I yearn for the chance to really make it big due to my successes, among the failures. If you really think about it, millions of people throughout history failed on several occasions before they finally hit the big one. (Keep in mind only one person in our history was perfect!) I still keep hoping for that chance...that opportunity to finally rise up and be seen as one who successes and doesn't...fail.
Song of Inspiration [Check it out on iTunes!]:
Song: "Impossible"
Artist: Anberlin
Album: Dark Is The Way, Light Is A Place
Here's the music video to the selected song...
This was me at Silver Dollar City (Branson, MO) riding on the Powder keg. You'll notice that I've whited out a person next to me; that would be my sister-in-law, Jen. I'm sure my brother and my wife will be disappointed that did this, but I have to remember that we see each other every summer, so I'm savin' my own skin! I'm sure the next question is 'What does this have to do with failure?' The best answer I can give is...not much. I think sometimes we'll look at people who make these faces on an intense ride like this and make fun of them. In some ways, if you’re made fun of, then you probably failed or screwed something up. That's actually far from the truth. If we can't laugh at ourselves, knowing that NOBODY IS PERFECT, then why are we here?