This weekend I was humbled by my 6yr old son. It was his first hockey lesson and let’s just say it didn’t go well for him. He spent a lot of the time behind the pack, falling and spinning around. As I was watching him, I heard all the usual criticism’s I would have used on myself.
I felt so bad for him, I kept whispering under my breath, “get up, get up”. It was hard for me to watch because of how hard he was struggling. But he kept getting back up, looking for me in the stands, and falling and getting back up. I promised myself that all I would do when it was over was ask him if he had fun. I would not comment or give him any advice. This experience was all about him.
When it was over, he came walking up to me with a big smile on his face. I asked him how it went. He responded “Great! Did you see how many times I fell? I just kept getting up and I scored a goal! Did you see me daddy?”
I was so proud of him, he acknowledged that he kept falling and it did not bother him, his measure of success was that he got back up and eventually put a puck in the net. There was no score, no opponents and all he wanted was for me to recognize his effort and his eventual success.
As adults I’ve found we only focus on success and rarely on the struggle to get there. We’ve lost the ability to enjoy the challenge, to be proud of the struggle along the way.
When’s the last time you enjoyed something you weren’t good at?
We always look at someone else’s success and envy it. We want all the wins and none of the struggle to get them. We shy away from new challenges all too often.
We are looking for the easy out, we can’t be bothered to try.
Can you do something hard and enjoy the failure?
Can you wear failure as a badge of honor?
So, the next time you are faced with doing something hard take a lesson from a 6yr old and get back up with a smile.
Or if you're facing something hard right now, message me I know I can help.