Day 23 of 31 Lessons from an Epic Beginner
Hate to say it, but sometimes, every now and then, not always, but occasionally, we fail for a reason.
In our current trend of "Pursue your dreams!" "You can do anything!" "Just start and you'll succeed!" it almost seems blasphemous that I'd hint that some things are meant to fail.
And, yet, once in a while, we fail for a reason. A reason that reveals our limitations. A reason that shows us maybe success wasn't really the point of that endeavor. Just maybe we aren't capable of taking over the world (we really aren't), and maybe Jesus is the only way to truly succeed at anything (He really is).
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My parents are entrepreneurial people. Having run a couple businesses when we were kids, it only made sense that my sister and I wanted to try our hands at starting a business. So, we bought a rainbow of sugar in all its forms to turn our front porch into a candy store. My mom helped us buy a few fructose supplies, because she's a dream-supporter like that.
We had a metal cash box, maybe even a couple 8.5x11 signs to attract all of these customers. Of which we had three. Three customers total--the three neighbor girls that lived down the block and that we saw often. They showed up, and when they found out we had candy for sale, they went home for coins. And when they ate the candy, they went home for more coins.
Several times over this happened. Until the end of the day, when we counted and had earned $13 in coins from these younger neighbor friends. Did we feel a little bad? Maybe.
Was this a successful endeavor? Not really. Buying a bunch of candy and selling to a couple people doesn't lead to an ongoing business. It just leads to sugar highs and upset parents wondering where all their daughters' quarters went.
Child business at it's finest.
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The truth is, we had obvious limitations. And we failed because of them. Not because we were bad, or because we didn't put enough effort. It just wasn't what we were supposed to be doing. It sure gave us experience. And, as it turns out, that experience is what we were supposed to take from it.
Not wads of money or a successful business. We were not supposed to be selling candy for the rest of our lives on our parent's front porch.
And such it sometimes is with our epic adventures. We start excited full of big ideas and grand dreams. And that's good. But when we fail (because we will fail often), instead of limiting ourselves to our parent's front porch, we should consider that maybe we failed for a reason. Maybe this particular endeavor was never meant to offer us success.
Don't let that get you down. We may not be able to take over the world, but Jesus already did. And we're on His team. So let the failure go, and move on to the next thing. There's a whole world out there beyond this front porch.
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Answer in the comments:
Is there a failure that you look back on and realize now why it didn't work out?
Day 23 of 31 Lessons from an Epic Beginner
