Hi Readers! I’m preparing a new speech — as opposed to my beloved tried and true one — which I’ll be giving it from noon to 2 on Saturday, June 4, in Park Slope, Brooklyn. It’ll also be filmed for my show. (Address: The Old First Reform Church, 778 Carroll St. Directions here. If you want to, feel free to RSVP to Jgillespie@cineflix.com, but it’s not required.) Anyway, what I realized I could use are some stories of great childhood failures.
By that I mean, stories from your youth when you goofed something up — and ended up being glad of that in the long run. I’m also interested in stories like that from your kids’ lives.
These days we are so focused on preventing our children from feeling disappointed, sad, or defeated that we sometimes forget that one way for them to grow that protective coat of self-confidence is BY letting them fail. It’s the old “fall off the bike and get back on” thing: If you never fall, you never learn that you can get yourself back on again. In fact, falling — failing — starts to loom larger than ever.
So think back and tell us some tails of your fails. And as failing is looming large to me at the moment (Gotta give a NEW speech! AND it’s being filmed! Gulp!) , thank you very much for your help. — Lenore
Filed under: Uncategorized, Zingers and retorts | Tagged: fail, failure, speech | 87 Comments »