“OK, Barry has lost it this time. I’ve wondered it a few times before, but this time for sure. I mean no one wants to fail. We all want to succeed. So that is where I will put my attention. Why would he even ask such a question?”
The famous Olympic figure skating champion Michelle Kwan relates the following story. “I started figure skating at the age of five, and the first thing my coach taught me was how to fall. I remember gazing up with a puzzled expression, thinking, Shouldn’t I be learning to skate? Looking back, I realize that my coach was very smart. She knew I was bound to fall many times throughout my career and that I’d need to learn to handle it.”
Isn’t the same thing true for you and me? You have no doubt already experienced many failures in life (and will probably have a few more). But how have you handled them? We can allow them to take us out at the knees and leave us in the corner licking our wounds. But a better way would be to keep those experiences in perspective. Michelle Kwan is perhaps known for her triple axles and all of those other challenging skating maneuvers. Yet she was only able to accomplish those because she was willing to take the risk – the risk of failing. But with that came the opportunity for success.
Perhaps you need to practice risking today – in order to set yourself up for opportunity.