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HeartWood
A blog about cultivating
creativity, connection and contentment
wherever you are

No Success Like Failure

1/10/2018

29 Comments

 
PictureA new year, a fresh start


​​In this first month of the year, it's exciting to envision good times ahead, to imagine accomplishments and successes piling up like drifts of fresh snow. This year, I'm also looking forward to goof-ups, flops, bungles, epic fails. To dumping garbage, if you will, on all that pristine snow.

​​Seriously? Seriously! It’s my intention to embrace failure, to view it as a teacher, not an indication of my worth. 
Picture
​This is not an easy mind-shift to make. I've spent most of my life aiming for success (however I chose to define it) and avoiding screw-ups. I've taken risks, but they've been calculated risks that I had reason to believe would turn out all right. For the most part, they did, or at least I convinced myself they did. 
​​So why am I so intent on failing now? It's because there are things I want to try without worrying how they'll turn out. I'm not talking about major undertakings like kayaking across Lake Michigan, just small endeavors that previously have intimidated me.
​For example, I have always wanted to draw, but my drawing ability plateaued around age seven. In college, I signed up for an introductory drawing class with a young, hip professor named Larry. For the first few weeks I looked forward to every session. Larry put on a Crosby, Stills & Nash album, demonstrated a technique, gave us an assignment, and cruised around the room offering suggestions. To this day, when I hear "Marrakesh Express," I'm back in that classroom, immersed in the scratch of pencil on paper, the magic of images taking shape beneath my hand.
PictureDrawing was once a joy


​​Drawing was a joy, and I thought I was making great progress. Then one day, mid-way through the term, Larry made a comment to a mutual friend, and the friend (who was not known for his tact) repeated it to me.

​"Larry says no one in your class has any talent."
​That did it. I finished the class, but my enthusiasm for drawing died. I packed up my pencils and never gave them another thought . . . until recently, when I realized I still have a desire to draw.
PictureI'd be happy just to draw like this


​​It's a modest desire. I don't care about creating realistic likenesses, I just think it would be great fun to draw whimsical, cartoonish figures, faces, flowers, creatures, and objects. I envy friends who embellish their journals and notepads with fanciful doodles that seem to flow from their pens as easily as words.

​So I bought a sketchbook and a book called How to Draw Almost Everything, which promised step-by-step instructions in the kind of drawing I want to do. I filled a page with with cartoon-y faces, first copying from the book, then making up my own. It was fun, and the results—while still at seven-year-old level—pleased me. With practice, maybe I could progress to advanced seven-year-old level!
PictureMy drawing is slightly better than this
​Emboldened, I added bodies. Not too bad. Then I tried animals—squirrels, to be precise. The first one came out kind of cute, but the more squirrels I drew, the more bizarre they looked. Hunched backs, distorted bellies, fierce faces. All of a sudden my seven-year-old talent had regressed to kindergarten level. And not even cute kindergarten level—more like extremely disturbed kindergarten level. I tried clouds, trees, suns, stars, ballerinas, mermaids. All disastrous.

​I remembered Larry's comment: no talent.
I laid the sketchbook aside and didn't open it for a few days. But then two things happened. First, I came across a couple of quotes I had copied from The Artist's Way when I re-read parts of the book during a creative slump:
Give yourself permission to be a beginner. By being willing to be a bad artist, you have a chance to be an artist, and perhaps, over time, a very good one.
 
and
 
          It is impossible to get better and look good at the same time.
​A few days after encountering those quotes, I was cleaning out some old files and found the first articles I wrote for the science writing class that led to the internship that led to my thirty-year career as a science writer.
PictureMy first attempt at science writing was not a success
​My first attempt, a story on the health hazards of photocopy machine toners, dated August 30, 1980, was covered with red marks from the professor. And with good reason. My lede was leaden, my verbs flabby and passive, and story so full of qualifiers, readers would be hard pressed to draw any conclusions from it. In short, a failed attempt.

​Yet if you had asked me—before I unearthed that old story—how I learned to write about science, I would've said it came naturally to me. Clearly, that's not true. I was once a beginner, and only by messing up and trying again did I get better at the thing I ended up doing best.
Picture
PictureScratch that!
​So I'm giving myself permission to be a beginner at drawing and all the other things I want to try or improve at: writing flash nonfiction, trying more challenging photography techniques, mastering yoga poses that don't come easily. And that means allowing myself to fail and try again.

​What do you want to fail at this year?
29 Comments
Gloria Switzer
1/10/2018 06:41:23 am

Wow again Nan! You really challenged me with this blog post! Thank you!! I'm in FL now helping my sister-in-law with my brother but when I get home from m going to b dare to do something I've had a "fear/ mental" block about for too long
I'll fill you in later. :)

Reply
Nan
1/10/2018 07:31:55 am

I can't wait to hear more about that, Gloria! Hope all goes well in Florida.

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Sally Pobojewski
1/10/2018 07:25:58 am

Hi Nancy! This made me laugh this morning and that's not easy to do early (for me) on a gray morning in January. I want to try more new experiences this year, too. First on my list is going to a gym and learning how to do strength training. I think this means weights and those scary looking machines. I will be a stranger in a strange land. We will see how this goes.

Reply
Nan
1/10/2018 07:34:14 am

That's a worthy challenge for the new year! Let me know how it goes. I'll bet those machines won't be nearly as scary after a session or two.

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Laurel
1/10/2018 07:57:28 am

Getting out that old dusty violin...

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Nan
1/10/2018 08:31:00 am

For real? That would be lovely.

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Diane Sack
1/10/2018 08:10:21 am

Love it, Nan.....failure is our Friend!

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Nan
1/10/2018 08:31:59 am

I'll have that printed on my yoga mat.

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Kathy misak link
1/10/2018 11:52:33 am

Loved the read, Nan
Yoga, piano, Spanish, painting.

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Nan
1/13/2018 04:57:44 am

Good stuff!

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Sally C Kane
1/10/2018 12:10:29 pm

Well, this post really stre-e-etched me! I'm smiling now. That was the point, I think. I laughed out loud while reading it. Mental blocks and resistant places? Me? Sure do. Yoga handstands. Writing something publishable that others will enjoy. There's more but I'm committing to reflection. Loved this post.

Reply
Nan
1/13/2018 04:58:26 am

I'm with you on those yoga handstands.

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Susan Stec
1/10/2018 12:11:43 pm

I was just thinking this morning that it’s time to get out my watercolors. The blue wooden art case I’ve had since the 70’s is calling me. Your posts always seem to come at the perfect time, Nan. A sketch class may also be a fun winter project.
Susan

Reply
Nan
1/13/2018 04:59:28 am

Sounds perfect, Susan. Enjoy your return to painting!

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Pili
1/10/2018 01:41:49 pm

Inspiring read, Nancy. I think of many of our failures more as adventures that may not have ended up where we anticipated, but taught us new things, discoveries😊👍

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Nan
1/13/2018 05:00:54 am

That's surely true, Pili. Always something to learn and discover, no matter what the outcome.

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Mary Ellen Darnell
1/10/2018 02:49:39 pm

My sister, Gloria Switzer, shared this with me. It made me laugh! I liked reading what you had to say!
:o)

Reply
Nan
1/13/2018 05:01:23 am

Glad to have you here!

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Sue Schneider
1/11/2018 06:05:14 pm

As always, I am stretched more than I expected. Thanks, Nan. I’ll be delving into more creative endeavors that have intimidated me in the past. This year will be about expanding artistic confidence.

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Nan
1/13/2018 05:02:06 am

Confidence is the key.

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emily everett
1/12/2018 07:53:56 am

Learning Spanish and strength training -- for starters. Just before I read your great take on failure, this quote came across my path: “Failure is a bruise. Not a tattoo.”

Reply
Nan
1/13/2018 05:02:56 am

That quote is a keeper!

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Gina webster
1/12/2018 09:24:38 am

I just love reading your blogs and I especially loved this one. It has me thinking of the new year and all the things I should try failing at!

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Nan
1/13/2018 05:03:29 am

Happy failing!

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Margaret Hrencher
1/17/2018 12:58:19 pm

Loved this, Nancy. And in my writing life, I must continually say, "I can do this!"

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Nan
1/18/2018 06:31:21 am

You can! You can!

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Katherine Myers
1/20/2018 03:40:45 pm

I haven't thought yet about what my challenge will be, but this post reminded me of a session I attended at a librarian convention on teaching writing to children (like me!) who wouldn't write because they were afraid it wouldn't be good (read that as perfect...). He said to assign them to write a bad sentence (mine would have had to be really really bad--overachiever mindset). He said anyone can write a bad sentence! Then comes the fun of improving it. Wish my English teachers had tried that method!

Reply
Nan
1/21/2018 06:20:27 am

What a brilliant assignment. I think I'll try that with myself.

Reply
Janet Glaser link
2/3/2018 10:47:06 am

Such wisdom. Don't we encourage children to try everything? Perhaps we should emphasize the "it's okay if you fail" part of the new experience. Writing a bad sentence is a wonderful idea. So it's okay if my drawings don't look like anything I attempted to draw or that GT laughs his head off when he sees it? Hmmmm. I may get brave enough to make a video of myself, wrinkles and all. Thanks, Nan, for this inspiring and re-wiring-our-brains post. !!

Reply



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    Nan Sanders Pokerwinski, a former journalist, writes memoir and personal essays, makes collages and likes to play outside. She lives in West Michigan with her husband, Ray.

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