Finding Failure to Succeed
Sophie Ding writes about the lesson that failure teaches us in her essay “Lessons from Failure.” She mentions that many parents attempt to “snowplow” the path of their children’s lives. However, Ding points out that this is not how kids will become successful in the real world.
Failure is scary, especially for those who put pressure on themselves to achieve perfection. In our modern society, failure comes with the stigma of not being good enough. Our world focuses so much on individuals becoming the best that we forget how many of the most successful people got to where they are now; not by being perfect, but by improving through mistakes and failures.
This essay reminded me of a quote by Albert Einstein my dad once sent to me. Einstein said, “A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.” I think that if we were able to celebrate not only each other’s achievements, but also failures, teenagers may be more apt to try new things because they would be less afraid to fail.
