FAILING

He walks over to me, smiles and says, “I haven’t seen you fall.”  Although I do not know him, his demeanor is friendly and I hear kindness in his voice.  Instantly I know, like most of the guys who ride remarkably, he is trying to teach me something.  This man, I would later learn, is a local legend. 

“I fall all the time!”  I proclaim, as I reply with a smile and a slightly defiant look.

“I haven’t seen you fall even once,” he persists.  He knows I have a lot more to give.  I know he is right.  I am not pushing myself.  I am being apprehensive.  So I begin to put effort into it and actually try.  I start to have a lot of fun and begin taking risks.  I run faster, I try to go farther and I try to stay on longer.  Sure enough, I am now flying off my board and I fall splat into the water.  I smash down into the sand, face first.  I stand up and, as I bend my head to the left and then to the right to stretch my neck, I assess I am OK.  I adjust my wetsuit jacket as I walk over to pick-up my board, and then I look over at him.  He is smiling again. 

I smile and humbly say to him, “Free sand exfoliation.”

He responds, apparently proud of my effort, “If you don’t fall, you’re not trying hard enough.”

This type of encouragement is one of the things I love about the skim community: they want you to succeed.  To succeed in this sport, though, you have to first fail.  You have to fall—a lot—to learn how to do it right. Just as in life and with relationships, you have to fail in order to succeed.  Why?  Because failing means you are trying; failing means you are learning.  When you learn from failure, you gain perspective and an understanding of what you can do better.  Failing also provides motivation to succeed.  Do you stop because you were not successful the first time, or do you get your ass back up and try again?

Let me be clear, when I talk about failing, I am talking about moments of failure.  Michael Jordan famously talks about how many times he failed, but he failed in making specific shots—he succeeded as the greatest basketball player.  Even in interpersonal relationships, when you learn from a moment of failure, you make the relationship more successful.  When you persevere through trials and improve yourself, you can relish in success.