Choosing to fail or quit

If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice.
– Neil Peart

When I was in high school I thought I needed to be perfect. If I was not getting As then I was not good enough (except in the subjects that I’d decided I had not been blessed with ability, like English).

Failing is one of the best things I’ve ever done, because I learned I can live through it.

As a result of some non-decisions I’ve had some failures in my life. Recognizing the reason for those failures has kept me from making similar non-decisions in the future. As a teacher I’ve seen students choose to succeed, and I’ve seen students choose to fail. They get what they choose. They often try to pass the blame (only for the failure, never for the success) off on the teacher, but it was ultimately their choice to do the work or not.

When you recognize that failing doesn’t make you a failure, you give yourself permission to try all sorts of things.
– Lauren Fleshman, American track and field athlete

Through my experiences with failures, I’ve decided that it’s easier to fail early on, you can bounce back easier from it. If a sports team loses one game in a season, it’s not nearly the heartbreak to lose the first game as it is to lose the last. Working with undergraduate students the past few years I’ve seen several who could use a good failure in their lives now rather than several years from now when they’ve missed opportunities to develop coping skills.

I also recognize that there is a difference between quitting and failing, a difference many people don’t make. I’m a firm believer that the saying, “Quit now and you’ll be a quitter all your life” is nothing but a bunch of hooey. Many times the best choice you can make is to choose to quit. From little things like quitting a book that just isn’t any good to quitting a job that just isn’t working for you any more.

Sometimes pushing through something to the end will build character and make you stronger. But sometimes making the choice to do something different allows your character to grow in other ways. The choices to quit have taught me my limits. And quitting now doesn’t always mean it isn’t a possibility in the future. I quite piano lessons when I was in middle school. Maybe it wasn’t the right time. I have a stronger desire to learn the piano now than I did back then, although not high enough yet for me to choose to start up again.

I chose to quite band after my sophomore year of high school because I decided it was not a good environment for me (MAJOR issues with the director). Choosing to quit band opened up my schedule to choose computer science my senior year, and just look where that’s got me. For me, quitting band was a great choice.

I used to tell my students that it was perfectly fine to make mistakes, as long as you don’t make the same mistake repeatedly. Making the mistake of choosing to fail through non-decision should be a choice you only make once. But choosing to quit does not make you a quitter or a failure. It means you know your limits and you choose growth in a different direction.