Noah looked at me just now from his sandbox and said, "I wanna fail mommy."
I thought for a split second about trying to boost his self esteem and encourage him not to but I stopped. I stopped because I thought I about all the times I myself have not done the very thing I desire to because I was afraid to fail.
So instead I said, "That's very brave of you. Did you know that some people are afraid to fail and miss out on a lot of cool things?"
Noah was silent for awhile and kept playing. After a few minutes of quietly pushing his truck around, picking up sand and pouring it out he replied.
"I'll do it Mom, I'll fail then," he said with quiet confidence.
And there it is, our greatest fears and accomplishments all wrapped up with a messy bow. Failure. It's brave and adventurous. Gruesome. Scary. Exhilarating? Necessary.
Yesterday a woman came into MOPS to talk about stress management and something she said really struck me. She talked about playing a game against a computer and how the computer has an algorithm that knows all the different moves you could make and plays accordingly. She was relating it to how God is in control no matter our choices. He can anticipate the outcomes of our next moves and as she was speaking I remembered a speaker named Danny Silk and how he talked about God not being afraid of our failures. God placed two trees in the garden and pointed them out. He knew the potential for bad choices and yet gave Adam and Eve the freedom to fail. And he had a plan. I don't believe it caught him by surprise or threw him into a worrisome tizzy.
So I ask him for the boldness to love in the face of failure. Mine, my husbands, my boys(oh those boys), friends, strangers.
And to create, dream and step into joyful desires willing to fail and fail hard.
Even at this post! lol* Hope you're failing triumphantly today.
