I still remember the exact spot where I sat in my sixth grade class and the unfortunate motivational poster that hung above me- “Shoot for the moon, even if you miss you will land among the stars”. Well, I had learned to associate stars with dead people from The Lion King (Mufassa chronicles that the Great Kings of the Past become stars upon their death) and naturally misinterpreted an already problematic poster to mean that if you aimed for the moon and missed, you would die trying. In my mind, people would then pay homage to you as a failure. Looking back through my school days makes me realize how education is really a masked competition of who could lead the more monastic lifestyle. The institution taught us to revere heroes without being encouraged to replicate their rebellion, to critique before teaching us to create, and to memorize perfection without acknowledging the value of imperfection.
The value systems that schools use to grade students do not translate well in real life. This is one of the reasons why baby boomer employers perceive us as the soft, silver spooned millennials- we lack evidence of our self-perceived specialness. Huffington Post’s “Why Generation Y Yuppies are Unhappy” showcases the following caricature that reveals one of the common frustrations of quarter life crisis:
The value systems that schools use to grade students do not translate well in real life. This is one of the reasons why baby boomer employers perceive us as the soft, silver spooned millennials- we lack evidence of our self-perceived specialness. Huffington Post’s “Why Generation Y Yuppies are Unhappy” showcases the following caricature that reveals one of the common frustrations of quarter life crisis:
How do you get “A’s” in real life? Seth Godin puts it very simply: “If I fail more times, I win”. In one particular interview with Behind the Brand’s Bryan Elliott, he recounts how he taught a relatively easy course at New York University’s School of Business that had no homework or exams. The only task that he assigned to his students at the end of the course was to call a person and sell them a subscription in front of the class. He states that “1/3 of the class did not do it” and that they would rather take a failing grade because they perceived the stake of being embarrassed in front of their peers too high. For a generation that’s been raised to dream big and simultaneously minimize the margin of error in their performance, the fear of failure threatens to neutralize the initiative of taking action and creates the perfect stagnant storm.
In Seth Godin’s schema of success, it’s not a matter of whether or not desired results can be obtained. Desired results are inevitable after failing enough times. He instead, places higher value upon having the initiative to take action.
Outline of Godin’s book Poke The Box
1) Take Action
2) Watch what happens
3) Modify action and take it
4) Repeat process as many times as necessary
The nature of our struggle to take action is purely a mental one as Ephesias 6:12 clarifies:
“For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms”. Those heavenly realms are the quarters of our imagination, the chambers that can materialize clouds of angst, fear and insecurity into solid brick walls of limitation. The real spoils of this mental scrimmage are reaped at the point when action is taken, after defeating the mental chatter that justifies inaction. Reframing success as such prevents us from repeating the fallacy of postponing happiness until desired results are obtained.
The Type K fails for the fun of experiencing new sights, sounds, tastes, and stories. He does not take failure personally. A fully developed Type K remains curious over the possibilities that a failed situation can bring.
