A Discourse on Failings

I will like to begin with a question which will sound like a rhetoric one but of which in all intents and purposes I desire that it triggers a chain reaction of thoughts in your heart. Here it is: have you ever failed in your life? It is safe for the goal of this discuss for me to assume that the answer to this question is yes. I say this because I have personally had several bouts with failings and although with every bout I feel like a loner on a deserted island, I have witnessed the desire many have to break free from the bondage of failure and realized that I am not alone after all!

Funny as it may seem, not too long ago – precisely during my university years – I considered some people impregnable by the sharp claws of failings. I remember a colleague we tagged “Prof.” He was a brilliant chap and deservedly excelled with a First Class degree in Chemical Engineering. On one occasion he was asked if he had ever failed academically and he surprised most of us by stating emphatically that he has. He was asked to elaborate and he explained that he once set a goal to score an A grade in a course but got a C. That didn’t in any way sound like a failing to students like me who were oscillating between Cs and Ds.

Sometime later I understood what Prof meant when I heard the legendary Earl Nightingale define success as “The progressive realization of a worthy ideal.” This definition was revolutionary to my psyche because it meant two things:

·    The first is that success is a journey. This means you don’t become successful when you attain something or even a goal but you become a success the moment you begin a journey towards a predetermined end.

·       Second to that is success is predetermined. This means that the success isn’t just the person who attains a big office or becomes rich but the person who is doing intentionally what he or she decided to do. A success is hence the school teacher who is a school teacher because that is what he wants to be and do. The success is the nurse who chose that profession herself and is doing a great job at it. This also applies to every other field of human endeavor.