My son got home late last evening. I wasn’t happy. He wasn’t happy. After his 13-hour day, with plenty of homework ahead, he looked tired and discouraged.
His reason for being so late? An informational session on a scholarship program, and its first set of qualifying exercises. He perked up when he talked about it, surprised that he enjoyed the activities they undertook, and pleased at his performance. It’s a competitive program. Many are nominated, and few are chosen.
Ironic, isn’t it?
Especially considering our conversation 24 hours earlier – the need to make more time, to work more effectively, and to separate getting in to school from financing it. As for this program, while it’s a wonderful opportunity, the participating universities are severely limited. Not one even offers a course in architecture – much less architecture as an area of study. More irony? My elder son won one of these scholarships. It was an intensive 4-month process to do so, but he is studying what he loves as a result.
Shall we add sibling rivalry to the complex mix now on the table?
Shooting for your dreams
So what do I do as a parent? Encourage my son to pursue this time-consuming process, knowing it will add stress and distraction when he needs to focus? Should he continue though the schools don’t offer coursework in his area of interest?
As that conversation wound down, another began – over an architectural model which he just completed. He wanted to show it to me, to ask my opinion on a curved exterior wall, a linear detail he wasn’t sure of, and the possibility of a more steeply pitched roof. His eyes glittered as he pointed and questioned. He no longer seemed tired. I offered my impressions of the graceful exterior with its angles and arcs.
Then he asked me to look inside.
I peered into his building. It was beautiful. Serene. It was spacious without being overwhelming. From the outside, a fanned pattern of pediments suggested piano keys. They cast long, linear shadows on the walls and floor of the atrium, a sort of interior painting that would change with the time of day, or the whim of cloud and sky.
“I love what you’ve done, using the light,” I said.
He smiled. “That was what I was going for.”
Seeing his pleasure, feeling his energy, the question that had been rolling around in my head all afternoon – could he be happy without studying architecture – was answered.
Options, love, conditions
Apparently, my son was asking himself the same thing. We circled back to the scholarship program as he began justifying how he might attend one of the participating schools and still study architecture, music, and the other subjects he loves. I knew where he was coming from; hours earlier, I was researching curricula at each of the schools.
It was getting late. I suggested he get to work. So he settled behind the slim table in his new study space and began. I climbed into bed with my laptop and read comments on yesterday’s discussion, thinking hard about the pressure I may be putting on my kid, and the pressure he’s putting on himself. Then I remembered last summer’s architecture program. I was worried then, too, yet on his return home, he described the experience as “The best thing I’ve ever done.”
As I read on, I returned to the comment that said it should be “okay to fail.” It was Di, of Jac’s Mum, who raised the issue. I stopped. I considered. I was – or so I thought – okay with the notion of “okay to fail.” I sensed what she was getting at. It was about love. Another reader commented that we need “permission to fail,” and tied it to unconditional love. That sounded good. But something about the phrase gnawed at me. If love is unconditional, then it should have nothing to do with success or failure.
I began to ponder the terms themselves: failure is a harsh word, bristling with negativity; permission is an easy one, tossed about lightly. Marry the two, and we potentially brew a recipe for disaster, for stepping away from challenging expectations, from tough goals, from the stuff of building character, and achieving.
Permission to fail, lazy society?
Permission to fail?
I thought about the declining work ethic in this country. How mediocrity has become no big deal. How setting the bar high seems to be out of fashion, replaced by excuses we manufacture when our output is less than stellar. We fall back on “I tried.” Can’t fault someone for trying, right?
How often have you heard your child say “I tried,” and so you backed off? How often do you say “I tried” – simply because you’re tired, you’ve gone through the motions, and you’re over it? Is trying enough? Shouldn’t it be about risking failure – and isn’t that different from trying? Isn’t that different from recognizing legitimate constraints your child faces – or talents in one area and their absence in another?
Reality demands that we recognize strengths and weaknesses. That is a different matter. This is accepting dismissal of those strengths and weaknesses – and accountability for dealing with them.
- Don’t we all have to risk failure at some point?
- Isn’t success predicated on a certain number of failures?
- When did we replace high standards for ourselves and our children with “I tried?”
Sure, we have lazy days, and worse – periods of burnout. Who doesn’t want to relax, to unwind, to hop off the merry-go-round for awhile? We need to refill the well – for our health, our well-being, our productivity, our inspiration.
But permission to fail? Shouldn’t we be talking about permission to take a risk?
Failure? Yes. Permission to fail? No.
Permission to fail? I don’t think so.
My son does not have my permission to fail. Nor does he have my permission to merely try if that’s the lazy way to get me off his back, or to justify going through the motions. But I will say this, and stand by it:
My children have my permission to make choices, to own the consequences, to change their minds, and to take risks, whatever the outcome. We may not know what that outcome is immediately. And I will love my children unconditionally, regardless of their choices and the consequences.
I believe we’ve grown lazy as a society – in our language, our manners, our expectations, our work ethic, our marriages, our schools, our professions, and yes, in our parenting – however understandable it may be as we face extraordinary weariness, isolation, and cultural “noise.”
Yes – to communities. Yes – to encouragement. Yes – to help – from each other. But no to permission to fail – individually, or collectively – which invites defeat rather than risking success.
Am I a hypocrite? An example of failure?
So who am I to take such a strident position?
I have been unable to secure regular employment, though I’ve looked for 23 months, applied to at least 20 jobs in that time for which I was fully qualified, sent emails, bid on projects, crafted targeted cover letters and resumes, and initiated contacts through online resources. I persist, though I admit it grows harder. To say that I am disheartened is an understatement. Sure, I get part-time and temporary gigs, but it isn’t enough. It’s a tough job market, I’m over 50, and I have constraints.
But I do not give myself permission to fail.
I network. I research. I’ve risked revealing my “professional self” to some of you – an uncomfortable disclosure for me – but a calculated risk. Perhaps a connection may help land more paying work. Meanwhile, I continue to write daily and to parent actively. Some days I want to give up. But giving up is a luxury I don’t have.
So tell me – am I a failure in your eyes? If I tell you I’m counting down to losing our home, with nowhere to go – then am I failure, or someone simply to be dismissed?
Reward for trying? It’s not enough
Trying isn’t good enough if there’s nowhere to live, is it? Persevering, risking – including risking failure – is what we have. It is what I have, and what my sons have.
I do not consider myself a failure – as a woman, a friend, a writer, and certainly not as a parent. Yet I am a disappointment to myself. I worked – and was paid for it – for more than 30 years. I feel my failure to provide financially more deeply than I can express. However, I become a failure on the day that I throw in the towel – on every dream, on the hope of earning a living, and feeling well, physically. I become a failure if I offer my son an example of giving up, of being lazy, of ceasing to look for solutions.
Some day, I wish to stroll through one of my son’s magnificent buildings, at his side, discussing as we did last night. I wish him to pursue his dreams – whatever they may be at 17 or 27 or 67 – formed of the strength of character I know he will continue to develop. And my insistence that there is no permission to fail in this family. Permission to risk – yes. And always, love.
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I much prefer permission to make choices myself. Permission to fail sounds like a cop out to me because it’s the opposite of what we’d really like to have happen. Permission to dazzle, to amaze, to wow the whole world — that we don’t give enough.
Your sons are so lucky to have such a strong-willed and unconditionally loving mom as you.
I will grant you that permission to fail is a poor term. If I think more specifically, perhaps I mean permission to fall. We all fall, and a few I know think it is the end to have fallen. It became semipermanent for one friend as she hide behind a wall of lies.
Having high expectations and big dreams is good, especially of you know that when you fall you will have love to help you up.
Failure is not getting back up, not striving. I won’t give my girls permission to quit trying. But somedays they will stumble, they will fall. Helping them know that that isn’t failure but part of the adventure is one of the harder parts of parenting. And we’ve only had small falls so far.
Passion about what we study is so important! I adore your description of your son’s architecture work. (Slightly unrelated side note, I have friends who moved for a year free college to get state school admissions and pricing. Yes, they had to wait another year, but they got to go where they wanted for less.)
And you are no failure in my book.
I did realize what your underlying intention was Kate. At least, I believe I did. That love is essential. That failure is inevitable. That we need to be there through wins and losses. I am a stickler for words, for their precision and their beauty, and I grieve that we have lost so much appreciation for their subtleties and their power. I include myself in the group of those who do not push hard enough to find the right word, or the “better” word – so critical when we’re dealing with complex subjects.
And thank you for what you say about my son’s work. Passion is important, I agree. Fortunately, he has several passions, and many gifts. I don’t want the doors closed before he’s had his opportunity to explore those passions, and to discover new ones. What parent would?
As for me, thank you as well. I do not consider myself a failure, yet I am failing in a matter that is pretty fundamental. There’s no denying it. But I keep fighting. It isn’t over until you-know-who sings, as they say…
His creation sounds wonderful… light, airy… spacious… I love it and I have no idea what it looks like!
There is a negative connotation with failure. We don’t use the word in my house though I believe that we have to fall now and again as part of the learning process… but it isn’t failing to fall, it is part of learning to fly.
I give permission to risk. I support risks and I support stability. Yet, as I write this I am not even sure that I know what it is to fail? I read what you wrote at the bottom of your post… and not providing for my family and doing everything I could – that would be just giving up on life and on everyone, and on myself… and is that failure?
My daughter’s great grandfather apparently used to say “I don’t want excuses, I want results.” I don’t want “try” I want choices, responsibility for the action, and I want integrity. My daughter doesn’t need to get the straight A grades – but she needs to put her effort into everything she does – not for the grade but for herself and the information she will learn. I want her to know that she has done her best – and that it something she has been working toward for years in ballet.
As for your son – it sounds as if he loves creating and designing. I hope that there are other scholarships he can obtain that support his passions and his dreams. I wonder if he believes he could thrive and love school were he to go into a program that doesn’t have his chosen fields?
I missed all the earlier discussion here but with regards to your son I think it is an amazing gift to know what it is he wants to do with his life and for him to have such passion for architecture and to enjoy it as he does. So many people, myself included, end up in their last years at school, not knowing what they want to do career wise in life. So if they ar are like me they pick a subject they are good at (in my case Math) and a course that fits with that (Business) and a career also (Accountant). I got lucky and wound up doing a job I loved, traveling the world and more. But so many people do not – spending their working lives wishing themselves elsewhere. You spend so much time at work it needs to be something you are passionate about.
So I think your son needs to be encouraged all the way to chase his dreams. With the love he has for architecture he has what it takes, the love and self belief that make dreams come true.
AM – I love your tale of how you meandered into what you do. Sometimes it is a wandering process and we find what we love. Sometimes we know what it is early on – may deviate and return to it – or may get to pursue it. I guess we’ll see how it goes. And what each day brings.
TE – Risks and stability aren’t mutually exclusive, which you point out by providing both. I wonder if we encourage our kids to shy away from risk sometimes, as parents, because we’re afraid of seeing them hurt? I wonder if I’ve been overprotective in some ways, for that reason. Failing is part of learning to fly. What a beautiful way to put it.
And, this, which you know: that specific things in life are not promised or deserved. They fall according to an inscrutable mixture of hard work, luck, connections, and so many undergirding systems of reality.
But, we must begin a journey with a map and destination. We must revise this map and destination in response to many things: reality, new ideas/interests, changing markets, health, relationships.
We begin at a beginning, which is what your son is doing, with your support and encouragement. We will also share stories of changed paths, opportunities, and yes, the paths that did not work out, or the avalanches that fell and rendered the path unpassable.
I like what Conan O’Brien said during his NBC-boot-kick to the curb:
” All I ask of you is one thing: please don’t be cynical. I hate cynicism – it’s my least favorite quality and it doesn’t lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you’re kind, amazing things will happen.”
The whole speech is available in many places.
—
But, Wolf knows something that I do. And, that our children do. That they must earn their way sooner than later. They might need to help us. My child last year offered to quit high school and start work. Child meant it. Child is aware that blood does not come from turnips nor money from trees nor good vibrations from being a neo-faux-Karmist-tuning-fork of a post-modern hipster-boomer-Gen-Jones-GenY-Xer.
(I do not mean to slight or hurt anybody by generational cohort or philosophical leaning or spiritual inclination. For the record, I count in my intimate circle observant friends whose religious code includes an ancient and complex articulation of karma. And, to them, the US-Western interpretation makes them screw up their faces in disbelief. Just like the phrase in Princess Bride to “inconceivable”: “I do not think you know what that word means, Boss.”)
I felt such love and loss and shame in that moment, of Child taking up a burden willingly. Then, I felt love, only.
Carry on WolfBoy with WolfMom — you are setting a path as you should; I know you will make something out of this that is good and true and honorable.
What a lovely, supportive response, NoNameRequired. Your child sounds amazing. You must be incredibly proud of his willingness to sacrifice for you and his offer to work.
This is brilliant, Wolfie. You weave a perfect argument here. One that works for you and one, I think, that so many modern parents do not see or believe. This somehow ties in–for me, at least–with the article Jen pointed me to about winning/losing and the modern-day give-every-kid-a-trophy syndrome. Work ethic. Risk. Consequence. We are big on all of it here in this house, even though I sometimes feel like a sham because there has been a lot of failure in my past. And, to be clear, failure from refusing to give something my all…failure from simply granting myself the permission. I’ve never felt good about any of it and now, finally, and at 32, I am learning a different way. Just in time, methinks, so that I can be a better example for my kids. So they can understand what I mean when I talk about effort and running hard and beating the other kid to the ball. So they can understand what I mean about doing your best and giving it your all. So they can understand what I mean about pushing yourself and surprising yourself and learning your limits by taking those leaps.
I’m big on risk. I think you know that. But I’m not always big on follow-through. It sounds like that’s the thing that you’ve really been able to teach your boys. And I admire that. I admire you, as a mother AND as a woman, with every story you tell of your sons.
Attributed to Thomas Edison, the quote states, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
You are most definitely not a failure. When you stop trying everything you can think of to solve a situation, then that is a different discussion. Our laissez faire culture drives me insane when kids are coddled in school without the expectation of really trying their best to achieve. From “effort” honor rolls to the elimination of honors titles lest someone’s feelings are hurt (or worse yet, granting honorary status to those that don’t make the grade), we’re teaching our kids that minimal effort is all that counts…so long as your psyche isn’t damaged. That’s not reality, or life.
Failure and giving permission to fail are two different things. One is inevitable for someone trying to achieve something. No innovation is every accomplished without a certain amount of failure.
I look forward to reading your son’s name in print right up there with Frank Lloyd Wright and Frank Gehry!
I give myself permission to FEEL. And sometimes that means I feel like a failure when things are extra tough but I don’t really believe that I am one, quite the opposite actually. If I were a failure I would have quit long ago – same goes for you.
Thank you for all the input and feedback, guys.
@Mindy – yes – feeling is different from being.
@Lisa – I love the quote!
@Sarah – Great call on that give-every-kid-a-trophy post. I think it’s very much related to this topic. It may be one thing at 3 years of age, but at 6? At 8? How do we teach our kids the necessary lessons of winning and losing, and handling both?
I don’t think I define “fail” quite the same as others. For me, it’s not negative. I am (oh, was) a high jumper, once upon a time. A ‘fail’ is a miss at a height that you attempted. For me, a fail implies that you didn’t meet a benchmark, whether it’s a grade, or a standard that you had set yourself, or that you felt others had set for you. It’s something that didn’t turn out as expected.
Now, perhaps I put my own personality and ethics into my response, and maybe that doesn’t generalise. For me, if I fail, it isn’t for want of effort. Maybe I got the approach to the problem wrong, maybe I didn’t understand the requirements of a task in full, maybe the very best I could do, simply wasn’t good enough. What I was trying to say in my comment yesterday, was that if it lowers the stress and clears the mind of the cluttered thinking that goes with having something difficult and daunting ahead, then let yourself consider all the outcomes. Don’t let the stress of a task to be faced, become monstrous in proportion, so that you feel as though you are being driven beyond your ability to cope, and out onto a ledge ( for some people, this is not a metaphor). That’s what I was talking about, in using the term “permission to fail”.
In truth, I think I’ve learned much, much more from my ‘failures’ in life – things I appraise critically, in retrospect, and on examination find myself and my approach, to be wanting. I tend to view my success in something, especially something that seemed impossible, as perhaps an outcome attributable more to chance, than to any special ability of mine. Now, that is just how I think, and probably warrants a few years in therapy in many people’s minds. But I’ve grown not to be afraid of failure; I’ll have a go at almost anything, because I know I’ve failed at things before, and it didn’t kill me (yet).
In the same vein BLW, I don’t think one’s life can really be considered as a failure, unless one didn’t live. How can we measure the contribution we have made in other people’s lives? Impressions we have left, that we weren’t even aware of, even in people we don’t know. Impressions that might not necessarily be linked to our proficiency in something, or our successes. For example, I might be inspired by your dogged determination to keep up the search for work, knowing that the next application or contact, might be what you have sought for so long. Maybe I’m inspired my your discipline, in writing and publishing every day. Maybe I’m inspired by your thinking, that you are always able to take the next step in reasoning, that I am unable to take myself. But for you, all these are things that you are accomplishing in what you might sometimes regard as your years of ‘disappointment’ with yourself. So, in that light, I think we all have permission to ‘fail’, and still be people of inestimable value in the world. There’s probably a really good quote I could insert here, but I can’t think of it… Epic fail, my kids would say… No, don’t get me started…
A high jumper? Wow. So you were a competitive athlete. That’s a whole other arena of setting goals, discipline to achieve them, and persisting when you don’t meet your expectations – or others. I would imagine you can’t help but bring some of that mind set (to me, a positive) to whatever you do.
I will say, you never fail to make me think, Di. And that’s a very good thing. I thank you for that.
BLW, I appreciate you revealing your truth on this subject matter.
As a child and a teenager, I talked to my parents openly about failure. I was lucky because as Asian parents go, my parents were supportive of my dreams. They encouraged me to try and keep trying, even if that meant failure.
When my father was young man in India, his dream was to immigrate to the United States. He took a risk and possible failure, but he pursued what he believed. With only seven dollars in his pocket, he made a life for himself and his family in Texas. I realize I maybe rambling here, but I think it is important to dream, to sometimes envision failure and dismiss it. So many pursuits wouldn’t be realized if people focused on failure.
I believe you are guiding your children with your honesty and insight.
Seven dollars and a dream. Talk about inspiration, Rudri.
I think you said it right with how you “become a failure on the day that I throw in the towel”. You can’t stop trying, you can’t give up.
As for your son taking on the extra challenge – I say bravo! I wish my son was half as industrious as yours. Also, when you were discussing the issue of being over-burdened and taking on too much work, it reminded me of similar situations – and I always thrive in those times. Not sure why, but if the pressure isn’t high enough, I’m no good.
Wonderful post. Your son is the person he is because of you. No matter what you have going on (I seriously hope they right themselves soon) you still show great strength, you took the time out to listen and encourage him. I agree with you one hundred percent, and no matter what you are no failure. Life and times turn us in different directions and some we may not like, but to give up or accept failure would be a tragedy to say the least. Keep on keeping on, your strength is amazing.
What a fantastic, thought-provoking and important post. I wonder about this often, how to achieve the perfect balance in teaching them that some of the joy comes just from trying and it’s okay that some of the joy come from achieving. I’m not sure it’s possible to get it right. But here’s the thing, while I don’t feel capable of engaging in an educated debate about mediocrity in today’s society (because I do think you are on to something), I also think it has something to do with everything we are expected to do. And I say this with the caveat of being an overwhelmed mother. I feel pulled in so many directions, and in trying to do well by them all, I find myself lagging at them all. And it’s hard. It’s hard to excel when you are tired, when you are always distracted, when you have trouble focusing because of lack of sleep, because of too much that has to be done. But I digress, and I’m running on. Thanks for this post! I’m going to feature it today as my Single Shot 🙂
Christine – I agree with you on the issue of mediocrity – our acceptance of it.
In the business world, there are times it’s more than “okay” to be “okay.” You need a good, solid product or service, not necessarily a great one. It needs to get the job done, be better than your competitor (or at least, you’re able to spin it as better), and be profitable – which means built / offered / provided so you can price it to make a profit, and thus keep going.
That isn’t mediocrity – that’s prioritizing, that’s surviving, that’s still meeting a market need.
We do that in life, too – and we have to, and I don’t believe there’s anything wrong with it. There are times when “good enough” truly is good enough! It’s a phrase I don’t care for, but appropriate if you’re to actually deal with the realities of people and situations: no such thing as perfect, no such thing as giving 100% on 18 tasks at a time, etc.
And that brings us squarely to your point. It’s hard to excel when you are tired, when you are always distracted, when you have trouble focusing because of lack of sleep, because of too much that has to be done. I don’t think that’s digressing; I think it’s a significant part of the dilemma in this country (and an important offshoot discussion from this post). And to me, it’s crystal clear when it comes to mothers that we’re expected to shoulder the impossible – and it is impossible, without a great deal of help. And even then, too often, women believe it isn’t enough.
Expectations that overwhelm us will invariably lead to a lesser performance somewhere. It’s a question of our own standards, society’s expectations, and more. But what is ironic is that the result is so often a pervasive willingness to accept “good enough” everywhere. As a culture. From all corners. And that worries me.
I think maybe a piece of this that is missing is: know your kid. Okay, and another piece: know what kind of parenting was done to you and which, like it or not, affects the way we view failure/success. And then we fling it back onto our own kids.
I was a Pleaser. My parents were very strict and my mother helicoptered, trying to save me from any kind of failure or trauma. The message I took away from this: it was better to do anything–anything–but try and then fail.
So I didn’t. I played it safe, always. Stuck to the things I knew I could do well and didn’t push the envelope.
And I did just fine. But I didn’t take any risks, and that limits in its own right.
You’ve done right in that you haven’t raised a fearful kid. But sometimes life gives us limits and we fail, and while you certainly don’t need to give him “permission,” if he is one who takes things hard and personally, I think it’s just fine to let him know that trying is the thing that matters most.
I have read your posts as I would from a friend, I have found your writings honest and reflective of my own life and that of my friends. The post, “Permission to fail”, brought tears to my eyes, I had really hoped for you to be actively employed sooner rather than later. My best wishes go to you and your family, and I love reading your posts and I’m glad to be a Fan!! Please keep up the great work and thank you so much for engaging me in many aspects of your life!
Thank you so much for this comment, Jill. It means more to me than you realize.