Sink, or Swim?

Have you ever had one of those days in which you feel that you just cannot win? You know, those days in which you are late to school, slip on the ice in the parking lot, spill part of your lunch on your lap, argue with a friend over something that is completely unimportant, and receive a bad grade on a quiz? Yep, one of those days. We all have! I don’t know about you, but for me, I look back at those days and cannot help but just laugh. However, at the time, laughing just wasn’t the way I always approached those unfortunate, seemingly unlucky, often embarrassing situations. But, I wish I would have.

Last week, I had the opportunity to spend some time with a few individuals who, without meaning to, caused me to sit back and think about how I personally handle those things that just don’t go right. We are all human, and we are all guilty of what this individual called “high arrogance, low self-esteem.” In other words, we often think we need to show that we know every answer, when, in fact, we really don’t believe we do at all.

I think back to a few years ago, when a pretty intense ice storm kept many of us Kansas residents out of school for a few days. My family didn’t have electricity, so my brother and I spent a few days with our grandparents. Now, I can sum up exactly how we spent those hours in one word: Monopoly. We played that board game over, and over, and over. This seems like a great way to spend the time indoors. However, my brother never particularly enjoyed playing board games with me, because for some reason, I always thought I had to win. The reason we continually played that game wasn’t that we were having that much fun, it was that I kept insisting that we play again every time I landed on one of his hotels, which were usually conveniently located on Park Place or Boardwalk. Basically, I didn’t know how to fail.

Let’s think about that homework or quiz that perhaps we could have done a better job on than we did. Go figure, we did poorly on our work because it wasn’t explained well enough, or we didn’t receive enough sleep the night before, or we’re just having a bad day. It’s never our own fault, is it? We are all guilty of trying to place the blame on someone or something else, instead of swallowing our own pride and admitting that we could have put in a little more of our own effort.

It is instances such as these where it is up to us to decide whether we want to sink or swim. While playing Monopoly with my brother, I chose to sink. Instead of accepting the fact that my brother’s Monopoly skills were apparently at an entirely different level than mine, I insisted on ruining his day by getting more and more frustrated. I had high arrogance and low self-esteem in thinking that I just had to win.

Wouldn’t it be better if we all made an effort to reverse that attitude, so that we would have low arrogance and high self-esteem? By accepting the fact that we all have room to grow and learn and that some days, things just aren’t meant to be perfect? In fact, that’s where we can grow the most! We aren’t meant to be the best at everything the first time we try it. All that anyone can ever ask is that we view our “failures,” or those instances in which we just can’t win, as opportunities to discover our strengths and weaknesses, and to learn.

The question we must continually ask ourselves is simple.

Will we sink, or swim?