Failing . . . Epically

I miss kindergarten.  Not necessarily because of all the nap times, snack times, and book times.  Not necessarily because of the sand box or toys.  I miss kindergarten because of the excitement.  Every day you'd walk in and no matter what the topic was, you'd love every minute of it.  The alphabet? Glorious.  Numbers?  Incredible.  Singing songs?  Yes, please.  And no matter what the challenge, you were geeked to try to overcome it.  You'd raise your hand with such fury that it was a battle to be the one chosen to answer.

Then something happened.  With each new year the excitement would be lost.  You'd raise your hand less and hold your thoughts more.  You'd let your wrong answers weigh on you like gravity. Now in high school, there are those who might go an entire year without ever once asking a question or trying to answer one.  Disturbing.

There are many potential reasons why people lose that kindergarten excitement in life.  The most influential reason: we become afraid to take risks.  We become afraid to learn.  We are so worried about getting something wrong or being judged by others that we don't even try to advance ourselves.  We are forever haunted by that infamously powerful word: failure.

What is failure? Stupidity? Thomas Edison failed at making a successful light bulb literally thousands of times (sources range from 1,000 to 10,000 prototypes).  Colonel Sanders knocked on the doors of over 1,000 restaurant owners before finding one who would try his recipe for fried chicken (and lived out of his car while doing so).  Abraham Lincoln lost eight different political elections before becoming president. What a bunch of failures, right? 

Every great person -- every innovator of thought, advancer of society -- knows the truth: Failure is feedback.  Failure is life's greatest teacher.  Failure is the attempted risk that always reaps a reward. That reward? Knowledge.  Information.  Understanding.

With this in mind, our classes were put to the test.  How do they respond to failure?  How do they respond to negativity in the face of taking risk?  How do they communicate frustration?

The task was simple: old school memory game.*  The twist?  Everyone participates.  No one talks.  By the end of the activity there was visible frustration (even yelling).  Yet, they were hugely successful.  They completed the task.  They didn't do it perfectly the first time.  That was exactly the point.  Perfection is a myth.  Learning is reality.  

Life isn't about how perfect we are.  It's about how we seek perfection by never giving up.  Every mistake provides an opportunity to persevere or an opportunity to surrender.  We either cherish the mishap and add it to our knowledge base or let it wear away our initiative.  Imagine if Martin Luther King Jr. said, "Whelp, if they aren't going to listen, I'm going home. Whatevs."  Or if the Wright brothers said, "We messed that one up.  Flying is a joke. Screw you birds!"  What if Michael Jordan was like, "Cut me from a high school team? Psshh.  Didn't want to drop nasty dunks on people anyway."  Instead they took every failure as a learning lesson that drove them to success.

So at what point do you surrender to defeat?  At one point do you wuss out on life and stop taking risks?  How are you responding to the moments that don't go your way?  Are you a quitter or a fighter?  Take a risk.  Fall down.  Learn from it.  Love it.  Failure is feedback.

Welcome back kindergarten . . .

*Special thanks to Amanda Wildes, Nicole Schremp, and Quantum Learning Network for the aided development of this activity!