When You Fail

I tend to cluster my failures all up in a bundle and haul them around all day with me. They are the first to pipe up when I begin to doubt what I’m trying to do, if that particular client doesn’t respond to me in a timely manner, or if I generally am having a freak out session when I should be creative and artistic. Oh the failures. They are a lively chorus.

“Told you that wouldn’t work.”
“I always thought you didn’t know enough to do that job.”
“I doubt you remember how to write that piece.”
“It’s too big; you’ll fail. Just stop. Just give up now.”
“Isn’t this how Trish works, barely competent.”

And on and on and on and on. Until my brain is so full of this that I freeze and give up altogether. The threshold to my small creative act for the day is too high, the barrier has been raised, and I’m just not going to succeed. Why try? I usually go looking for chocolate about now.

We all fail. We all have really guilty consciences. We can’t even walk normally because the staggering weight of our conscience keeps yapping and pulling from our amnesia-riddled minds more things that we fail at. More situations when we didn’t treat someone right, we didn’t think good of everyone at that dinner, we did judge, we did try to take shortcuts with that project. We did hurry too fast and not think about what we were saying or doing.

But you know, there’s really nothing else for these failures to do. They can’t get up and help. They can’t erase themselves. They can’t even force us into a better place on their own. They are stuck with us. And I don’t think it’s a mutual arrangement.

I don’t think we’re stuck with them. I don’t agree that we have to carry around these failures all our lives. Sure, they’ll try. They’ll scream like banshees when you try to tear them from you. The screaming is not the tough part. The tough part is when you’re out there trying something new, completely naked without any failures to blame. Then whose fault is it?

Why do we get stuck here? Why can’t we remember what we already know. We’re going to be fine. We can do it. We can conquer, we can get past the barriers. It just takes some faith.

This is the best comfort I have. All my failures are gone and have been gone for some time. There’s no reason for them to be hanging around except to turn me back to faith. There is a God and I am not Him. That’s basically the gospel. No, you don’t have to “get religion,” you just have to believe that every single thing you’ve done wrong in your life is covered. “How is that possible?” I can hear people asking the question.

Our brains can’t comprehend it. There is no scientific method to prove it. That’s why it’s faith. That’s why it’s a relationship between me and God. There was a sacrifice for me. For my failures. That’s how I walk, try again, keep going, and drown out the unpleasant failures that attach themselves to me and will not let go.

There’s no other way around it. Folks try to meditate to clear it from their brains, they use psychedelic drugs to numb it, some even torture and murder innocent children to drown out what they can’t bear to hear. (We talked about that case on Monday.)

Failures are not really your friend. Sure, they remind you that you are human, they spur you on to bigger and better things, but they can also numb you to real life. They remind us that we are not God. It’s what “Know thyself” actually means. Know your boundaries, know that you are but mere mortal. But don’t hide in your failures. Get strong.

Have faith.

Believe.

Get up and try again.

Tagged as: brilliant, Learning the Craft, overcoming resistance, real, writing