Getting back up again

A few days ago, somebody asked me to write an essay about something that I feared and how I overcame it. That got me wondering about what I actually feared the most. Was it the fear of snakes? Not quite. The fear of wild animals? Not really. I was struggling to come up with a meaningful idea of what I truly feared.  That was, until I had a discussion with my parents, and we talked about a common fear - the fear of failure. Common, it may be, ordinary it is not.  I believe to a greater or lesser extent, it is inside all of us. Losing, embarrassment, letting down those who believe in you. The thought of losing was quite scary to me, scary enough that it restricted me to only what I already know rather than allowing me to branch out and participate in new activities. This meant that I would miss out on something I might enjoy if I tried it, because I was too scared that I would fail at it.

“I’ve not failed, I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Thomas Edison, a man who was successful in creating the lightbulb, stated that he made mistakes seemingly endlessly before he was finally successful, but he did not give up. Scientists who are doing the best to create a cure that could save millions of lives, they fail hundreds of times before they are able to create life saving medicines. Take Dr. Jonas Salk, the man who invented the cure for Polio. If he had been afraid of failing and making mistakes we might still not have a cure for a crippling disease. Nelson Mandela said, “I never lose. I either win or learn.”

I remember watching tennis players during press conferences and interviews and hearing

them say that they would not worry about the end result but instead focus on each individual point and giving that their best shot. Competing for the love of the game. That made me think about how I could keep my thoughts in the present rather than thinking

ahead about possibilities. Especially since I am a sportsperson myself, it made the connection easier.

I believe that the turning point came when I began to try new things for the simple reason that I wanted to experience them rather than focus on outcomes. In the last year I have participated in events like the Hackathon and MUN and I have also begun public speaking in school. I made a conscious effort to put my hand up for things and school and eventually,

sometimes to my surprise, I found myself enjoying them. I just redefined what I believed failure to be.

Failure is letting life go by without trying something new. Failure is not actively participating and allowing opportunities to come and go.

Looking back now, I believe that anyone who tries to overcome this fear could do the same. It’s not about pressure and failure, it’s about putting up a fight and doing your absolute best. That is the true definition of success or victory.