A-, At Worst

Last week, I wrote a piece called "B-, At Best." In it, I was heavily critical of myself after a recent speaking engagement. I recognize that I'm probably too hard on myself, and many of you pointed out that I'm probably too hard on myself, but truth is truth. I could have done better. I could have done MUCH better!

A few days ago, I had another speaking engagement. This time, however, I felt different about my performance: A-, at worst. I think it was a highly successful event, and I couldn't have been much happier with how I conducted myself.

There's an elephant in the room, though. The elephant in the room is the fact that I couldn't have crushed this most recent performance if I hadn't been willing to risk failure during the preceding talk. I don't think I needed that B- to propel me, but whatever happened on that fateful B- performance day equipped, fueled, and propelled me to achieve what I just did. Everything builds on everything.

We can't be afraid to fail! So often, I watch people stand idly while their dreams pass them by, simply because they are scared of failure. There's nothing that feels worse than failure- that is, until much further down the road, when we feel the agony of regret. Sometimes, enduring failure is the prerequisite for achieving success. Everything builds off everything. Thus, we need to keep moving forward. Always forward.

Therefore, whenever I look at myself and feel like a giant turd of failure, I recognize it's all part of the game. I can't make a positive impact on this world without experiencing the pain of defeat, and neither can you.

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