This is not a negative post. I am not complaining, I am not angry, but I am trying to be mindful.

When you take big risks there is always the possibility – a high probability – that you will experience significant failure. If you try you might fail. In education, people love to talk about how good failure is and how much you can learn from it. I think that is true, but some failures feel a little like part of an initiation ceremony. You have to get burnt a little (or a lot) before you might be able to move on.

I have been in this situation before and it hurts. Anyone who says it doesn’t is not being honest with you. It hurts and stings, but remember, this was always your choice and in some way even here there is learning going on.

I am not going to write about this particular fail here in this post- I don’t think that is important. What matters now is to get something down here for my own reflection. When you have a big fail you first have to resolve to go on. I have already done that. Then you have to look around to see what you could do next time, find out if you can understand what happened and start to learn. I am doing that too.

There is one part of all this, however, that you will go through on your own. It’s the pain of not making it. It is tied up in pride and calls for lots of humility. Humility is very good. This summer I needed a big dose of humility when the guides took my bag on Kilimanjaro – not for an afternoon, but for most of the trip. Without that humility I would never have made it to the summit, sometimes I am still surprised that I did make it.

With a big fail, there is also an element of fear. If I go on will I fail a second time? Will I make it? Should I even try? So far in my big fails I have always kept trying. That is probably natural stubbornness. Even though continuing runs the risk of another failure, I feel compelled to try.

With big fails there is sometimes a breather, a pause, before the next attempt. The pause is important. I need time to let the emotion settle, gather a bit of perspective and rebuild my confidence. At the start of a pause, it’s a good idea to get some things done quickly, without too much deliberation. Signal that you are going to make another attempt. This is very very important and I commit to trying again.

Then you can rest in the pause gather up strength and start the climb again.

This is not a complaining post, but it is part of the journey.