Monday, October 01, 2007

Fear of Failure: The Baseball Analogy

“Hank Aaron,” Dad says. “Hit a lot of homeruns. But think about how many times he struck out.”

“I know,” I mumble, tears hanging on the apples of my cheeks.

“You gotta learn to strike out, baby.”

“I know.”

“I ain’t saying you’ve got to be satisfied with it.” He pauses. “But you’ve got to get comfortable with it. And I’m not saying don’t try to hit the ball. Swing hard. But know that sometimes, you’re going to miss.”

6 cat calls:

Ruby said...

Your dad is a wise man.

I think that's a great way to look at it.

tempe & chris said...

Aw, I love your dad. I can hear his voice in my ears as I read this.

Hang in there. Keep swingin'.

mendacious said...

wait? what? are you in a softball league or something?

i think you should give it up and join the theatre. softball always made me panic. the swinging, the running, how to pay attn to the base coaches... it was crazy. i always got stuck in rt field. in theatre i got to be a nun, a crazy person, a gangster... run in the rain, steal tacobell sauce. i'd like to think i made the right choice. i'll have to go blog aboutit now. ; )

Niki said...

My fortune from a fortune cookie during last week sobfest that I am totally unprepared to go into the courtroom: "It could be better, but it's good enough."

Somehow, that made me feel better. This baseball analogy has the exact same effect.

penelope said...

Yup... all you can do is the best you know how to do. And if we never failed, how else would we learn anything?

Cue said...

Some of the best times of my life have come from falling down hard.

...Which I know sounds trite and silly, but it's so TRUE.

So, like your dad says -- keep at it. Just remember that there's a certain beauty in missing the mark, too.