On Failure, A Theophany?

I really have no idea what I’m talking about. But failure hurts.

It’s not a uniquely American problem, but it is an American problem. You see, we are a culture that hands out participation trophies. Little statues for children playing soccer. I have a couple stashed in a box upstairs in the attic at my stepmother‘s house. “You didn’t win. Still, we can’t have you feeling bad about it.”

Of course, not winning at a sport is not the same thing as failing at a sport.

But I digress.

I get the impulse. It’s a laudable impulse. And I really don’t have a problem with it. But when I talk about failure in the public sphere on social media, most people try and dissuade me from even entertaining the notion that I have failed. We don’t want one another to feel badly. I love that about us.

But I am finding more and more that I need to entertain the notion that I have failed. Not completely. I am not a “moral imbecile” to quote “Airwimming.” But I did set out to do something and failed to do it. I tried to earn a PhD. I failed to earn a PhD.

I know that advanced degrees aren’t the be-all end-all of human existence. But it was very important to me. One of the few vocations I would fantasize about as a young person was being a college professor. And though I know that the industry has changed completely… for example, it is now considered an industry… I still hold onto my fantasies.

I have this very specific fantasy of volunteering to teach the 8 AM sections of Intro to Religious Studies. I find there to be a lot of humor in the idea of torturing a bunch of hung over 19 year olds. “Let’s explore the ritual dynamics that change when one employs a Gamelan.” Cue: video. Loudly.

I would serve coffee. I’m not a monster

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Meeting God in Failure

Of course, God is in this. In my grieving, and in my very privileged form of suffering, God is present. God is all up in this. She teases me. She consoles me. She reminds me that I am not junk. God sends countless people my way to remind me that I am not junk. It’s all grace. I see the face of God in every comment on social media that expresses my worth as a human being. I see God in the love of my family and friends. But I do not believe God can make me something I am not.

Also, God won’t turn this around and make me suddenly successful in some other way. God doesn’t work that way. God isn’t a puppet master. We have free will. At least I believe we do. God is not willing my prosperity any more than God willed my failure.

God’s will is neither a script nor a set of computer code.

Finally, the admission to failure and embracing the grief and suffering that comes with it is an invitation to imitate Christ. Am I making too much of this? Perhaps. But many words have been written about how the cross itself is a symbol of failure. By any earthly measure, the Jesus movement failed. Jesus died. His promises were not kept. His dramatic reading of Isaiah in the fourth chapter of Luke did not come to fruition. His mother’s song, that great Magnificat, did not come to fruition.

Eschatological hope is hoping in the midst of failure.

Failure and Self-compassion

I understand the importance of not being cruel to myself. I do not, however, consider it cruel to be honest with myself. There are reasons for my failure. Principally among them are my limitations. I came face-to-face with my limitations. Apparently, I’m not capable of writing a dissertation. I don’t know if it’s attention deficit disorder, my bipolar, too much time online, a low boredom threshold, or simply a kind of lack of sticktoitiveness. I guess don’t possess the determination that one needs to necessarily finish a project like a dissertation. Others with similar limitations have. It’s also increasingly clear to me that I probably don’t possess the intelligence one needs to do so. This admission makes me and lots of other people uncomfortable.

Limitations are real. Call it “bandwidth“ if you like. Call it anything that helps. You understand that some things are out of reach and there’s nothing to be done about it. You can push, pull, and stretch, but you just cannot get there from here.

With this in mind, I need to be compassionate with myself. I need to be gentle with myself. I need to see my limitations and not judge myself for them. I understand that God does not judge me in that way. But, it is challenging. I have certain expectations for myself. I did not meet those expectations. I am clever, but not all that intelligent.

This is not the same thing as saying, I am stupid. I am not stupid. But I am not smart enough to do what I want to do. That distinction is really important to make.

I am not as smart as I would like to be.

This is painful to realize.

Again, faced with my limitations, I need to meet myself with compassion. It’s OK not to be as smart as I would like to be. It’s OK not to be a college professor. It’s OK not to be a professional ethnomusicologist. It’s OK. I am no less beloved of God.

Grief and The Holiness of Lament

One of the reasons why I’m so insistent upon this language of failure is because I want to grieve. I want to grieve realistically. I want to grieve honestly. I want to be able to name what it is that I’m grieving without standing there with a participation trophy in my hand, pretending that I won simply by playing the game.

I will never get to be a college professor. I grieve this. I will never have a PhD. I grieve this, too. I lament.

There are books in bins, in bags, and piles on the floor of the room we call an office. There are also books on shelves, in boxes, and stored on a hard drive. There is so much knowledge, so much inspiration in this room. Yet, I could not channel it. I could not bring the vision to life. Instead, everything is waiting. For what? I do not know. I have failed to produce a dissertation. There is no one to blame. There are no extenuating circumstances that I can point to his explanation. Instead, I have only my own mind, heart, and soul to behold, as I come to terms with failure.

To help myself, I find peace and even joy in small things, in the commonplace. Failure is not the end, but it is an ending. Failure is a small kind of death, but it is not death. What comes after failure?

A wounded body embarking on something new.

I hope.