failure – Michael Seidel, writer

TL/DR: I lost again.

I received a paper check in the mail. After posting it to the wall for action for ten days, I launched myself to the credit union to make a deposit at the ATM. After processing it all, pressing the right buttons, and answering their questions, the machine told me with an exclamation point, “Invalid Transaction!”

“How the fuck is that an invalid transaction,” I muttered at the screen. It didn’t answer.

Well, one failure is a fluke. Two is a coincidence. Three is a trend as a failure. I did it four times. Fed the check into the machine four different ways. Always came back, “Invalid Transaction!”

It’s not me, I consoled myself. Has to be the machine. Still, it did sting to walk away a failure.

Daily writing prompt

What strategies do you use to cope with negative feelings?

View all responses

I regularly endure negative feelings, but weirdly, I consider myself an optimist.

Dealing with negative feelings, though, had to be, um, dealt with. By the time that I was in my teens, I knew that I tended to be negative. I’ve always felt like an imposter, less capable, less intelligent, less talented, than others give me credit for being. It’s difficult for me to accept praise. I literally cringe from it.

I found answers in books. From them, I evolved some coping mechanisms.

One, I write down the worse that I think can happen from a given situation. Somehow, writing that down like that lays bare my concerns. It helps me visualize that the likelihood of many of my fears are not as great as they loom in my mind. Secondly, writing them down helps me develop insights into how to counter these fears and make them less likely to come about. It also helps me perceive the emotional side, where my negative feelings reside, and the intellectual side, where the wherewithal to learn, try, and succeed, actually resides.

Next, I learned to grit my teeth and accept that I will not succeed at everything I attempt. I will often fail. But if I don’t give up and try again, then I can learn from my mistakes, keep trying, and maybe, just possibly, succeed.

Third, I let myself rail at myself. I do this alone and I’m pretty hard on myself. But after railing, I feel an emotional release. I’m ready to take a deep breath and try again.

Lastly, I let myself procrastinate. I know that probably sounds flimsy as hell, but giving myself time to find the right energy to take things on has proven to help me overcome my fears and worries. Along the way, hand in glove with that, it gives me time to think back on similar situations where I thought I would fail or something bad would happen, but then ended up with a good outcome. That fosters encouragement that maybe this isn’t as bad as I’m making it out to be.

And now, really, lastly, I learned to laugh at myself. To not take myself and my failures or my successes too seriously. I learned how to have fun while trying these things, to admit that I screwed up, to mock myself for screwing up.

That always made it easier to try one…more…time.

Daily writing prompt

How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success?

View all responses

I’m one of those people who believe and practice, you must be willing to take risks and face failure if you want to succeed. The classic example is learning to walk: we all must accept trying to take those first steps and risk falling in order to stay upright and put one foot in front of the other to cross a room and get where we want to go.

In my case, I’ve succeeded many times when I’ve tried. My failures have been as a sales person. I’m talking about goin’ door to door. Selling vacuum cleaners. Knife sets. Cookware. Hey, I was desperate to improve our situation and increase our income.

But I learned that I’m not a person who wants to pressure people into buying things like that. First, the products were overpriced. Second, they weren’t the greatest invention in the world, which was basically the line I was to spin. I didn’t believe it, and I didn’t accept it, and I couldn’t say it. I felt like a hypocrite and a fraud when I did.

I later learned, yes, I can sell things. I’m pretty successful at selling ideas. And I’ve sold tangible products, like coronary angioplasty products. But to succeed in that arena, I had to believe in what I was saying. And to believe, I couldn’t ignore my principles.

Understanding grew from those failures and setbacks. I learned: don’t ignore your principles. And I became known as a dependable person, trustworthy, responsible, reliable. I probably would have learned those lessons without my salesman failures but going through it helped me cement my understanding of who I am, who I’m willing to be, and what I will do to make a dollar.

In the end, I believe I’m a better person because of my failures.

Last night’s dream was like a summer blockbuster movie. Long thriller, lots of plot and action. Some highlights are offered.

To start, a civil war was breaking out. A young man, I was part of a large gang itching to go against the enemy, roaming a city’s residential area. We lacked weapons and training, though, except for the baseball bats, hammers, knives, and other weapony things we managed to scrap up. As we walked, cocky as hell, issuing ballsy statements about who we were and what we were going to achieve, we looked for a enemy gang we’d heard was in the area, we started hearing reports from other people that space invaders — aliens — had landed and were conquering the world.

We discussed this dubiously, reckoning this was world class bullshit being spread. But as we walked, I stared left. There, I saw five black ships. Each was a square, with squared off stubby wings. I’d never seen anything like that. More, the five traveled in perfect spacing, revolving like they were part of a wheel. I saw them for just a few seconds before the horizon hid them.

Pointing, I shared with the rest what I’d witnessed. Disturbed silence took over the group. Others peaked around, looking for the things I’d described. Seeing them again, I pointed, shouting, “There. There they are.”

There were more this time, but the design and behavior was the same as before, and everyone saw them. Now we started taking the reports of invaders from space more seriously. Searching for more news about it, our focus changed to repealing the beings killing humans and trying to take over our planet.

Early fall slipped over late summer. We’d gained some weapons. I carried an automatic rifle. We were moving silently through a mostly abandoned neighborhood. People lived there not long before, because all the lawns were green and trimmed. We ran down a street past dead animals. The invaders were brutal killers. I called to others, telling them not to look at the dead cats, dogs, and birds littering the area.

A large house was selected as a refuge. Set back from the road, it had an enormous lawn. That would give us distance from the street. The aliens always came down the streets. Long legged, with thick thighs and calves and big feet, they looked like Sasquatch. Hard to take them seriously as advanced conquerors from space.

After getting our group into the house, I helped oversee getting people settled in the large, dark basement. We warned everyone, stay quiet. Rest and eat. Those of us armed would stay up on the ground level with our weapons, ready to repel the invaders if the house was found. I decided I would go outside to check the situation. Unbeknownst to me, others with weapons followed me.

A family came running around another house’s corner. Obviously frightened and panicked, I grasped that the aliens were after them. They barely spoke English. I conveyed to them to go into the house and go downstairs and stay quiet. Seeing one of the others behind me, I ordered them to take the newcomers to the house and settle them in the basement. As they went on, I faced the street, preparing to approach it to see if aliens were coming.

Dusk was coming. As I crept forward, an alien rushed around the corner. I dove to one side and rolled into hiding. Gunshots broke the silence behind me as one of my comrades shot the alien. It fell, dead.

Horrible mistake, I knew. We didn’t have the armaments or people to take on the aliens. I knew from experience that other aliens would come looking for the source of the shooting and to see what happened to their member. “Run,” I hissed at the rest. “Hide. Don’t go to the house.”

Worried about drawing attention from the house where the rest hid, I took off left behind a row of houses. Hit and run, I told myself, hit and run. I knew that would only work so long because the aliens weren’t fools.

Three other gang members were behind me. That surprised me but I set up two to hurry ahead and hide, expounding to them that we needed to move fast, never stay in one place, emphasizing hit and run, hit and run. The remaining member and I would do the hit and run thing for several hours. The aliens would realize what’s going on, and try to ambush us by setting up at another house ahead of where we were going. That’s why my pair of friends would already be waiting to shoot the aliens. Then we’d all take off.

With the plan set in motion, my buddy and I conducted breathtaking, frightening hit and run raids, running out to the street, shooting an alien, running back behind the house, hiding in bushes, shooting whoever came back to investigate, and then running to the next house to repeat the whole thing.

The sun was setting. It was growing colder, darker. I worried about ammo.

As expected, the aliens figured out what I was doing and tried to ambush me. My friends stepped out behind the two hulking aliens. I shouted, “Shoot them, shoot them.” My friends stood, rifles raised, frozen and gawking.

The aliens came after me. They always killed by some kind of injection. Close proximity was needed. They were strangely fast. I knew this but let them rush me. As they did, I threw myself to one side, firing while I did, managing to kill both.

Profusely sweating, breathing hard, I berated the two who’d failed to act and then ran to the street. No more aliens were in sight. Telling the rest to come with me, I led them back toward the house where the rest hid, watching my back as I went, angry that the others had failed when the moment came. I wondered then who I could trust.

I knew, too, aliens would be coming to the area to investigate the others’ deaths. We would need to move again. Grim-faced, I took in the last red rays given off by the setting sun and prepared myself for what needed to be done.