Double Failure
A friend of mine broke his arm for the second time this weekend. It had just healed as well. He had had metal plates put it and taken out and went through a massive ordeal to get it back to near-healthy working order. Then, after playing some flag football, his arm broke again. Back to square one.
Doing long and arduous tasks sucks as it is. Doing long and arduous tasks in an attempt to recapture something you already had before is even worse. It must be simply agony to try to recapture it for the second time.
Though the thought of re-breaking an arm is sickening on a number of levels, there is a silver lining to double failure nonetheless.
There is no lesson in winning, only in losing. The Chinese have a proverb that says something similar to that, but we don’t need their ancient legitimacy. It’s pretty self-evident. The question at hand, though, is whether there are lessons to be learned in re-losing.
I believe there is. That lesson is mastery.
When I was sixteen, I took my drivers test three times. I failed it twice. I didn’t fail many tests back then. I was the type of student who paid attention in class, didn’t study and then would take a test. I’m not saying that every test I took was outstanding based on the “no study” method, but I never failed.
So, the first time through, I failed and parallel parking. Okay, perhaps I was rash and arrogant the first time through. I now knew the test. I knew exactly what to do. Failure, lesson learned, try again, right? But, instead, I took it again and failed the parallel parking again.
Sure, I could make excuses on why I failed twice. I was using a mammoth Audi 5000 station wagon instead of the tiny Hondas that were used in driving school. That’s not important, though. After the second failure, I got some trashcans and practiced parallel parking in front of my house all Saturday afternoon until I mastered it.
I passed the third time, but, again, that’s not what is important.
What’s important is I am a frickin’ master at parallel parking now. I know what you’re thinking- yeah right. I know, I know, everyone claims they’re a master at weird pointless things like quarters or Super Mario Brothers. On top of that, everyone thinks they’re a good driver. Independent of all of that bias, I am incredible at parallel parking. Really. And its not arrogance; the skill is actually only the result of being a failure at something relatively simple.
My skill lends itself quite useful in DC and I am quite thankful I have it. And I owe it to one thing and one thing only- double failure. (I know, I know, that’s kind of two things, but you get the point).
Doing long and arduous tasks sucks as it is. Doing long and arduous tasks in an attempt to recapture something you already had before is even worse. It must be simply agony to try to recapture it for the second time.
Though the thought of re-breaking an arm is sickening on a number of levels, there is a silver lining to double failure nonetheless.
There is no lesson in winning, only in losing. The Chinese have a proverb that says something similar to that, but we don’t need their ancient legitimacy. It’s pretty self-evident. The question at hand, though, is whether there are lessons to be learned in re-losing.
I believe there is. That lesson is mastery.
When I was sixteen, I took my drivers test three times. I failed it twice. I didn’t fail many tests back then. I was the type of student who paid attention in class, didn’t study and then would take a test. I’m not saying that every test I took was outstanding based on the “no study” method, but I never failed.
So, the first time through, I failed and parallel parking. Okay, perhaps I was rash and arrogant the first time through. I now knew the test. I knew exactly what to do. Failure, lesson learned, try again, right? But, instead, I took it again and failed the parallel parking again.
Sure, I could make excuses on why I failed twice. I was using a mammoth Audi 5000 station wagon instead of the tiny Hondas that were used in driving school. That’s not important, though. After the second failure, I got some trashcans and practiced parallel parking in front of my house all Saturday afternoon until I mastered it.
I passed the third time, but, again, that’s not what is important.
What’s important is I am a frickin’ master at parallel parking now. I know what you’re thinking- yeah right. I know, I know, everyone claims they’re a master at weird pointless things like quarters or Super Mario Brothers. On top of that, everyone thinks they’re a good driver. Independent of all of that bias, I am incredible at parallel parking. Really. And its not arrogance; the skill is actually only the result of being a failure at something relatively simple.
My skill lends itself quite useful in DC and I am quite thankful I have it. And I owe it to one thing and one thing only- double failure. (I know, I know, that’s kind of two things, but you get the point).
posted by American Dilettante at
2:28 PM
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