My almost nine-year-old granddaughter was with me this week. We had a wonderful time riding the golf cart to spot deer and wild turkey, swimming, painting, even binge watching a couple of kids’ series on Disney. She is a bundle of energy and ideas. Her exuberance and confidence in herself are awe-inspiring. She has ideas about how to make things from trash. She is convinced that she will be able to design wings so that humans can fly. Her mind is constantly working, seeing inventions in the most mundane things. She sees no limitations on bringing her ideas to fruition. Hers is the confidence that comes from child-like innocence. She doesn’t see that anything is impossible. In her mind, where there is a will there is a way.

I worked hard this week not to let my practical mind clash with her impossible dreams. I encouraged her to think outside of the box, to work on her ideas, and to be open to new thoughts. It is said that things are impossible until they are not. Once barriers are broken, a new world opens. My granddaughter can’t see failure since she doesn’t see it as failure.  If one idea doesn’t work, she adjusts and tries something new. Perhaps her thoughts and ideas will open new ways of looking at the world. Perhaps as she experiences life in her fertile mind, a barrier will fall and something entirely new will arise that will benefit the world.

It is tempting to quash ideas which I know from experience won’t work. It is tempting to let the wisdom of my old age get in the way of innocent dreams and brilliant ideas. Those temptations come from a place of protection. I don’t want my sweet girl to fail or to be disappointed. However, if her ideas don’t work, if they fail, she will have the benefit of learning through her own experience. She will be able to figure out what went wrong and what didn’t. If I keep her from trying, through my own cynicism, I deprive her of valuable experience.

So it is for all humans. If God/dess doesn’t allow me to try and fail, I am deprived of deep learning experiences. I am meant to try and fail throughout my lifetime. It is through this experimentation that I learn and grow.  For some reason though, I got the message that failure was bad, that only perfection was acceptable. Since I couldn’t do everything perfectly from the beginning, I didn’t try anything new. I didn’t experiment or play. Many women that I know have been trapped in this web of perfectionism, afraid to venture into new territory for fear of failure.

To my granddaughter, everything is an adventure. She is convinced that she cannot fail, therefore she will try anything. She is fearless. She runs with her ideas, and when those don’t work, she has new ideas. I want to be more like her, to be open to all possibilities. What would I try if I knew I could not fail? What would I try if failure was just another step in the process of growth? What if failure wasn’t a dirty word?

Barbara Garland
August, 2022