I was one of those obnoxious people growing up that was just naturally good at school. As long as I went to class and took notes, I could pass the tests with flying colors after very little studying. Essays were a cake-walk. I’ve always had a predilection for writing. Even in college, I wrote my papers the night before they were due and never got lower than an A. I’m organized, pay attention and was smart enough to make school a breeze. Chemistry was the closest I came to a class making me struggle, yet I still had an A when I dropped at semester because it conflicted with the art class that I wanted to take. I was that person. Feel free to hate.

The weird thing is that now that I’m older, I wish I hadn’t been that person. I wish I had been forced to learn early on that you have to work for your success. Instead, I was taught that if you show up, put forth a modicum of effort you will succeed. Yes, I had enough to deal with as a kid without throwing in struggling at school, but still. Because of this education, I have been slapped in the face as an adult more times than I can count, because I expected something to be a cake walk and it wasn’t. The first couple of times it happened, I was flabbergasted. You could have knocked me over with a feather. “What do you mean I didn’t get what I wanted? I showed up and worked toward it a little. That’s all it takes!”

Nope. I have now learned that life is not that simple, and things rarely work exactly as you planned them to. Especially not on the first try! But I’ve also realized that there is more to learn in failing then there is in succeeding. That sounds insanely cliché, but I guess it’s cliché for a reason: it’s true. I have learned more about myself, my friends and what I truly want from life through my failures then through all of the soul-searching I have ever done. I think the biggest one in there, is what I’ve learned that I truly want from life. Think about it, you fail at something and you find yourself sitting there at the bottom examining what you had been striving for. All of sudden, the extraneous bits start to slough off. “Well, that bit isn’t all that important, and that bit would be nice, but isn’t essential. Now if I could only get this.”

So you go after whatever the “this” is, and you leave the bits you pared off behind. It’s simpler now, more focused. You work toward it and you fail again. Sitting at the bottom, you once more evaluate. You once more whittle down, once more become more focused. You become clearer. Then you try again, fail again, re-evaluate again. Rinse and repeat until all that is left is the core of your desire. The wrappings and glitter and bows are gone, and all you are left with is what you truly want and it resonates deep in your soul. It resonates so profoundly that you realize you’ve been going about it all wrong, and shift gears, change tactics completely. Stride out once more to conquer the world. I feel like that’s where I am now. Rinse. Do not repeat. I hope.