False Start ≠ Failures
Dec 9th, 2009 by Sam Song
In American Football, which happens to be my favorite sport, a YELLOW penalty flag is thrown when there “is movement by an offensive player (other than the center) after he has taken a set position” (Wikipedia).
MOST FAILURES ARE SIMPLY FALSE STARTS.
Let me explain by first sharing with you a Nike commercial featuring the greatest basketball player of all time, Michael Jordan.
“That my game was built on flash and not fire.”
It can get quite depressing when I look back at all the “failures” in my 31 years of life. There had been so many ideas, projects, goals, ventures, diets, savings, blogs and etc… that never reached it’s desired end goal.
The birth would start with a restlessness. I would not be able to concentrate, sit still and/or sleep. I would be uneasy until I was able to unload it somewhere, usually into my sketch book.
The next few days, the roots will begin to dig in and it would begin to grow. (e.g. Domain name bought, Branding, Photographs taken, business plan created, run a few miles, open a savings account) It would consume my precious resource of time and energy.
The initial momentum will keep it alive for a few days, weeks, months but then it would begin to wither and fade away.
I FAILED… or did I?
Have we been to loosely labeling our false starts to Failures? I have been rediscovering past projects that have fallen into my “failure” bin and resuscitating it back to life. And in this process, I have been discovering that the projects were not necessarily failures but just simply false starts.
Wrong timing. The defense was showing “Blitz” and reacted prematurely.
I am not making light of the failures and how much they are necessary. I totally agree with all the Michael Jordan stated.
Failure gave me strength, pain was my motivation.
Failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed.
But sometimes, ideas go into to the black hole of failure not to be revived and tried again. Simply bad timing, wrong economic atmosphere, wrong audience, wrong execution can kill a Great Idea.
That’s my journey. I’ll let you know as I take my supposed “failed” projects and place them in my “false starts” bin. Maybe the “Hike” count was on 3 not 2.
Have you had any projects that might have been “false starts” rather than “failures”?
In the original recording of Green Day song “Good Riddance: Time of Your Life” there are two false starts in the beginning. I love that they kept it in their track. This song went on to win the 1998 MTV Music Video Award, featured in television shows and countless photo montages at weddings. (I can attest to that!)
Good stuff Sam…love watching these videos.
I think God measures faithfulness and not our criteria for success. The fruit of faithfulness is his doing anyways. If we remain faithful, we can’t fail.
Thanks Charles.
I been thinking the timing is all God’s. All we can do is continue doing what is right in Love without regard of success.
Hey Sam,
Loved it. I to am constantly learning, making mistakes and growing. I love a quote related to software quality that goes something like this: “An expert in a given field is one who has already made all the mistakes necessary to deserve the title of expert.” Now the tricky question is, what is the process for applying what we have learned from those mistakes? Then, for the Christian, how do we inact the changes in an aditude of love? Faith without works is dead, just like good intentions without applied effort is meaningless.
sam, when you filet your heart mine gets healed a little more in the process. thanks.
Thanks Ron. Great quote.
“An expert in a given field is one who has already made all the mistakes necessary to deserve the title of expert.”
Ed,
That’s a beautiful statement. Thanks. You have done a lot to help bring this project about. I’m one that has been EDified!
Yes, I agree with Ed. Wonderful. Isn’t that the gift of community. You’re becoming more of a leader with authority, credibility, and power with ever honest, “filleted” entry.
Failure and false starts in my view are building blocks for success. They will go to waste if I don’t do anything with them. Perhaps we are supposed to reflect on what God is telling us or teaching us through our failure and false starts?
I heard a wonderful story today and wanted to share it. It related not only to the failures in life, but how God sees us in those situations. The story began with a mother of a severly retarted child that was to a state that he was institutionalized during the week and the parents would bring him home for the weekends. One weekend, the mother was cleaning up the kitchen and God seemed to ask her, “Why do you love him? Why, when he won’t bring you a grandchild, or get married or get a job or drive a car or make a name for himself?” To which she replied, “I love him because he is mine.” To which God seemed to reply, “And that is why I love you!” I said all that to say, don’t believe the lie from yourself or the enemy that you aren’t good enough or you’ll never get it right.” The truth is, you will one day, even if it has to wait until heaven, and until then you are still dearly loved by a heavenly father, because you are His!
Thanks April! This is definitely a part of my Soul Care.
Peter,
I like the idea of “Building Blocks”. I think the ultimate failure is not to learn from it.
Ron,
Good words man. It’s definitely about being in His Embrace. But at the same time, in that, I would want to make Him proud and take the risks confidently knowing that His arms are there to catch me if I fail. Thanks man.
[...] I haven’t done it in so long, but this one just came out of my Soul. This is one of the false starts I’ve wrote about [...]
[...] have been in a season of study of my past failures and false starts. And what I discovered was that I had, what Mike poetically called, the tendency to “set up [...]