Failure and Happiness

To anyone who may end up reading this who does not currently have a wordpress blog, please allow me to inform you as to one feature of it. In the top left-hand corner of the screen, there is shown a small graph, demonstrating activity on your blog for the last 48 hours. For the last few days, mine has been empty. I have had no views of my blog.
Now, a blogger’s task is, ostensibly, to attract attention and traffic- the average blog is started by someone with a pressing need for attention and validation, which certainly explains why I’m here, and so this fact basically means that I am failing as a blogger.
So, I thought I might share with the internet something on the subject of failure, something with which I have extensive experience. For example, the rugby side play for are basically out of this year’s league competition having won 5 from 13 matches- this coming after a season in which we won the league, lost only 3 times and were undefeated for around 5 months, while the side I support are currently lying 11th out of 12 in the league and have lost either 5 or 6 games on the bounce, just 4 years after they won the league. From the social front, I can count the number of friends I consider to have had over the years on my fingers, am perpetually single and not long ago finished a period of counselling- this helped, but I now find myself in the midst of even greater psychological issues. My mood cycles between mental and deeply depressed on an annoyingly regular basis and I see little sign of my situation improving. I could go on. I consider myself to have failed, to some extent, in every aspect of my life- and yet as I sit writing this, I exist as a happy person, or if happy appear too strong, then to say the very least I am content.
Why? This seems to make no sense- my reasons for happiness seem minimal. The experienced conscience-attackers among you may like to point to the fact that, from the very fact I am writing this, I have access to a computer, I am able to play and watch sport for enjoyment, have access to psychological support, have a roof over my head, food in the fridge etc, etc, but the kind of people who say these kinds of things have probably been shouted down often enough to know the kinds of arguments that can be proposed against them. But what they have to say does have relevance. You see, to someone without a roof over their head, a house may seem an impossible luxury. To a child who gets one meal a day and is developing kwashiorkor, the delicacies of a fridge may seem unparalleled delights. To the manager of a small business struggling during the economic downturn, the stability and prosperity of a larger, more successful business may seem a cruel injustice- and yet the manager of this business, surviving far easier than it’s smaller compatriot, may consider his stability to be just as bad as his struggling compatriot, compared to the prosperity he may have experienced in recent years. Conclusion- the satisfaction a person shows with their state of existence is entirely relative to their personal experiences.
When you think about this, you know it already, but it is genuinely astonishing as to the amount of stuff that can be understood simply by thinking over stuff you know. For example, any parents or soon-to-be’s reading this, for example, who want my advice on avoiding bringing up the kind of spoilt brat every parent dreads, could well consider this principle. Children who are ‘spoilt’ are basically always wanting more. The reason (it seems to me from my experiences anyway) for this is that their experiences of asking for something are that if they are showered with the modern, expensive, toys, then always having the latest toy or gadget seems to them a normal state of existence. When this changes, and they are not allowed their new favourite, this seems to them akin to an invasion of their human rights, and as such they complain and get the ‘spoilt’ tag (N.B. I know that I am in no way qualified to give this advice, so please don’t treat it as fact- it’s just what seems logical to me).
Now, how then does this relate back to me? Well,  having considered this logic, I began to realise that all my adjudged ‘failures’ were relative to previous experiences. I consider the rugby side I support to be failing, but the side who are in joint 11th with us have just been promoted and their fans are probably glad to be mostly out of the danger of relegation. I consider 5 wins from 13 to be a bad record, but considering the calibre of side some of those losses have been to, I can think of a few teams who would give their eye teeth for that record. And the list goes on- my social life is bad now, and compare to guys I know it’s appalling- but I know that I am a better person, with a better social life, than I was before my counselling- I feel things are bad now because I am not progressing at the same rate as I was previously. As such, I consider all my problems, and realise they are not problems, really at all. And it is this that enables me to consider my life more objectively, remind me of my family, the people I do love spending time with, the epic wins that will stick in my memory together, and the amazing camaraderie of my team- the drinking sessions, the laughs, the mates. And it makes me a happy person.
For one last comment on the subject of failure, I turn to one of the most inspirational quotes I have ever heard, courtesy of Michael Jordan:
“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed”

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