Failure is inevitable.

Now hear me out. I was a determined little kid who believed I could do anything if I practiced and tried hard enough. This served me well – I learned to skateboard. I learned to juggle. I learned to ride a unicycle. Yet I failed at all of those things – repeatedly – before I actually was able to do them.

Mind you, there were other things I failed at repeatedly without ever being able to succeed. I desperately wanted to fly, but no matter how often I jumped out of trees and off the roof, I never was able to be like Superman. It was impossible. I was tilting at windmills.

But there were fun things I did accomplish. I didn’t give up on my first, third or even fourteenth failure. I kept trying.

Sports fans get mad at me when I say that baseball is about failure – but think of all the chances you get to hit the ball! In fact, Francis Vincent – then Commissioner of Baseball – said:

“Baseball teaches us, or has taught most of us, how to deal with failure. We learn at a very young age that failure is the norm in baseball and, precisely because we have failed, we hold in high regard those who fail less often – those who hit safely in one out of three chances and become star players. I also find it fascinating that baseball, alone in sport, considers errors to be part of the game, part of its rigorous truth.”

Francis Vincent – from a speech given at Fairfield University, April 1991

When I was little (and learning about baseball), I naturally exhibited determination and resilience. I kept trying until I mastered my desired skill. I think these traits are inherently human to little ones – after all, we didn’t learn to walk without falling down a few times.

At some point as we got older, failure scared us and we stopped trying. I certainly stopped jumping from heights – landing hurt! I became convinced that my earlier belief was false – I could not do everything I wanted to do, no matter how hard I tried. As time went on and I “grew up” more and more things felt impossible. Sometimes I didn’t even bother to try.

Such is the dilemma of being an adult. Sometimes we’re so scared of failure that we refuse to even attempt whatever it is that we want to do. Or, if we do try, we are turned off at the first failure.

Francis Vincent would urge us to try again – we have three strikes before we’re out, and that’s just in one appearance. We’ll have more chances to bat.

In school, softball was my game. I was a damn good catcher and a bit of a slugger. But one day when faced with a fast pitcher, I couldn’t discern quickly enough whether her pitch was going to be a strike. I simply froze and watched the pitches cross the plate in front of me. My coach was furious. She told me to swing anyway. I thought it was a stupid idea, but feared my coach, so I shut my eyes and swung my bat.

Not only did I connect, but the ball hit the fence and I ran for a triple. It was worth trying.

Another example: I went to UVM after high school, but only completed two years. I wasn’t that great a student and, while I didn’t flunk out, I couldn’t get the scholarships I needed to continue. My parents wouldn’t co-sign the loans and I couldn’t afford it on my own. It took me over twenty years to return to school, because I wouldn’t step up to bat. Yet I finally did get my degree, graduating top of my class – while working three part-time jobs and parenting my step-son. I knocked the ball out of the park.

We’re going to fail – the trick is to remember that failure doesn’t have to be the end of the story.