Failing to succeed

You may have read the title and thought, this is going to be an article about failure. But if you read it again with a different emphasis, you’ll see that it could be about failing in order to succeed. There is a yin and a yang to this whole process that is hard to ignore.

I write this as a confluence of two unrelated occurrences takes place: a roadblock in my training and the completion of reading a really insightful book about an American journalist’s spiritual quest to quiet the constant chatter in his head and become more mindful. It goes by the unassuming title “10 % Happier” by Dan Harris.

As I mentioned, this comes at a time when I am at a crossroads in my fitness program. I am supposed to string together some of the skills I have been working on so that they become a flow routine. The problem is, I have not succeeded in executing all of the skills in the program. Despite diligent practice and patience, I am still struggling with several skills. What is the point of practicing a flow of exercises when some of them are not doable yet? The answer is, there isn’t any point. The answer is to go back to the beginning and work through the program again until the exercises become doable.

Practice things you can’t do.

There are several that I am having trouble with, but my real nemesis is the crane hold (pictured). One day I had a breakthrough, succeeding in holding the position for 10 seconds. I did this several times that day. But since then I have not been able to repeat it, with one notable exception: one day, I held the pose for a record 15 seconds. However, most days I cannot hold it for more than a second or two if at all.

This setback has taught me that progress is not always linear. It has also taught me that you must keep on failing in order to succeed. I know I will succeed, it is just a matter of time, as long as I keep trying. Even more than the latter two lessons, I have learned patience. I know that I have genetically inflexible wrists – in one direction anyway. They bend quite easily forward, but hardly at all backward. So I know this is working against me and I will have to work at it more than someone with flexible wrists.

Dan Harris says that sometimes even when you do your best, if things don’t go your way, you may become "unconstructively upset", in a way that hinders your ability to bounce back. He suggests that dropping your attachment to results is the key. He says that when you are "wisely ambitious", you do everything you can to succeed, but you are not attached to the outcome. If you fail, you will be maximally resilient, able to get up, dust yourself off, and get back to work.

His winning formula looks like this:

Non-attachment to results + self-compassion = a supple relentlessness that is hard to match. Push hard, play to win, but don’t assume the fetal position if things don’t go your way. (Did I mention Dan Harris is a master wordsmith?)

When you fail, telling yourself I only need the grit to start again, is sometimes easier said than done. In the Buddhist tradition, Dan Harris makes a list of “obvious but often overlooked truths”. I have borrowed some and modified others as I see them.

Here are some tips that might help:

• Try the same thing, different ways.
• Don’t compare yourself to others. Some things come easier to some people and focusing on this can be detrimental to your confidence and motivation.
• Go easy with the internal cattle prod. –A quote of Dan’s I particularly liked.  It is easier to get down on yourself for small failures than it is to congratulate yourself for small successes but those who are self-compassionate are better able to bounce back from missteps. If you can create an environment where your mistakes or misses are forgiven and flaws are candidly confronted, your resilience expands exponentially.
• Learn how to care and not to care. When learning a new skill, an air of not caring will get you closer to success than overt caring. Another tricky one but an idea worth exploring.
• How badly do you want it? This may seem at odds with the latter but it really isn’t. If you want it badly enough, you will keep working at it.
• Remember that all successful people fail.

Nothing worth having comes easy. Whether it is a new skill, a problem at home or at work, doesn't matter. If you want to succeed badly enough, you will keep trying. After all, there is nothing wrong with trying to do something awesome!