Have you ever stood before a door, your hand on the handle, a dark landing around you and the joyful and warm noises of a party beyond that door? Have you ever held the handle impatiently, endeavouring to open the door and cross the threshold but without success?
Have you ever felt like you were about to take part to that party? To see the winking colours of joy, the luring sounds of enjoyment, the heady touch of fun? The music filled your ears, your feet were chafing with impatience tantalized by the rhythm, and your hand was pulling frantically the puckish handle.
"I won't let you in, you can forget about it!", the closed locked was saying. We could hit the door, kick it, shout or be despaired, but the door would remain locked.
Have you ever felt like this? And how did you react? Did you get angry? Did you try to kick in? Or were you conquered by frustration? Did you shed some tears and accepted the dark landing as your final destination?
But, you told yourself, I saw other people getting in before me, opening the door and participating to the party. The door didn't seem locked, I didn't thought it was.
And indeed it was not. This is called failure and it's not predetermined. Some things in life don't turn out as we expect they would, we find obstacles and unforeseen events, and royal roads sometimes fork.
We are not what we would like to be, we don't get what we wish for, we are annoyed by doubts, fears and anguishes that don't call a truce but in rare and brief moments.
We are b-sides that don't stand a chance of reaching the top ten, but how many of you know incomparable and stunning b-sides? True pieces of art that maybe the market wouldn't appreciate?
We usually block before a closed door, incapable of accepting the missed happy ending, accusing others, blaming ourselves, swallowing tears and passed opportunities.
Have you ever thought about digging down in your pockets and look for the key?
If, like the University teacher Dustin Wax suggests in his article How to fail at practically anything, failure was actually one of the strongest forces of existence? And if avoiding failure would be the real failure itself?
"It’s the failures we face, large and small — and the way we face them — that make us who we are and give us the opportunity to make ourselves better. How we fail is at least as important as how we succeed", writes Wax affirming that both failures and successes are necessary to forge our character.
We find ourselves before that door again, we know it's closed and that it hinders us from crossing the threshold and participating to the party. We looked for the key in our pockets and here's a miracle: we feel the cold metal touching our skin, it's the key.
Instead of fearing failure, let's fail greatly, let's embrace failure, like Wax says, and we'll find our way to success.
Before a crossroad, facing a failure in the right way can help us find the traces of our lost success and to understand the reasons of its fleet. Wax talks thoroughly about it in his article and in the following one called 10 reasons you aren't achieving success.
The door is still closed, but now the key is in our hands and the lock won't put up resistance. We shouldn't ask too much to ourselves, but understand what we can do and learn to do it well.
And if for some people this awareness represents a failure, for us it will be the first step on the road to success.
Come on, what are you waiting for? The party won't start without you!
Article and photo Info
- Credits: Photo by practicalowl
- Article translated from the Italian by Marta
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