My theme has become – even if I fail a 100 times in the day… I will always try ‘one more time’. For me, I pray, I will always try one more time than my last failure, disappointment, fill in the blank. I’m a goal setter – it gives, in my opinion, meaning to what I’m doing and especially… why. Even as a child, I don’t remember my parents responding to my question(s) with a – ‘…because I said so’. Therefore, mistakes are not as devastating but provide a basis for my – ‘one more time’.
I really don’t remember being afraid of making mistakes because I don’t ever recall being afraid of ‘failure’… then again, it is in the definition. How do you define failure, disappointment, mistake, etc.? Disappointment, on the other hand, is never a good thing. For me, if someone (especially a significant someone) is disappointed in what I did (or didn’t do) or said (or didn’t say) – that has far more reaching emotional implications. I don’t like being a source of disappointment – especially to the Lord.
Simultaneously, I am quite aware that I do disappoint so this becomes a check point in my being and doing – admittedly, that I disregard (much to my eventual chagrin) at times. The point for me is that this becomes a learning point and a basis on which to judge what I do and why. It also serves as an understanding to act upon not just intellectualize. Whatever my basis for mistakes – failures – disappointments – etc. I don’t stop, or at least rarely. This becomes my impetus to correct or attempt to redeem or apologize… but not to stop.
‘One more time’ is really a mindset and standard by which I attempt to choose how I face those times. Perhaps part of my ‘problem’ is that I was raised with the axioms: ‘that if anything is worth doing, it’s worth doing well’ and ‘if at first you don’t succeed – try, try again’. Not a bad standard. And yes, there are times that the only thing you can do is apologize and take a different approach. But then again… a different approach is part of my definition of ‘one more time’.
