Finding Success in the Face of Failure

Today I’ve done something I never have done before. Today I let failure get the best of me. During our second softball game of the day and my only at bat in that game, I walked out feeling like a complete failure. I only could think about badly I have batted this season, how terrible my average was, how I was the weakest player on the team and how I had failed the team so much this season.

The worst part about all of this now looking back is the fact that I wouldn’t even accept the consolation from the players on my team for putting in the effort. I told the coach I was done, packed up my stuff and left without saying goodbye. The game wasn’t even over and I left.

I am very disappointed in myself. I let athletic failure take away from enjoyment of a sport that I have become so passionate about.

I now have to seek redemption in new areas. I know I’m not the best athlete on the team, in fact I’m probably the worst. I might be one of the most passionate people playing the game but that passion just isn’t enough.

This year I have not been playing my best softball, whether it’s just bad luck, lack of playing skill, a hitch in my swing or whatever… The one thing I will accept is that this year I’m in a transition period and I think part of my problem with me playing softball right now is that transition period.

I am doing something that I don’t think anyone on my softball team has ever done. I’m at the start of a transformation of going from a self described fat bastard to a person that can look himself in the mirror and be proud of himself and be in the best physical fitness he has ever been in ever.

The start of this journey started when I stepped on a scale and the display popped up 249.0...

I knew that I could not let that number roll over to 250, I was killing myself and I was on the brink of having some major health problems. The journey is now about 5 ½ months through and I’m down to 233 pounds. I’m hoping to get down to 200 or less pounds by the time I go home to visit my family at Christmas.

I believe that I can fully accomplish this goal. I also believe that I’m getting ready to make some serious headway at this life long goal of mine. I have never been an athletic person, I’ve always been the chubby kid. The one that found his comfort in food and being lazy and spending a lifetime on a couch watching TV. This year that changes…..

Having said this, I think that part of my frustration today on the softball fields came from the fact that I have been knocking off pounds here and there the past 2 weeks and I thought “oh wait till this weekend, I’m going to be stronger, faster and more athletic and I’m going to be so much better….” Well then in the first game: I grounded out and then I hit into a double play before I told our coach to pull me. The next game I struck out swinging. The most embarrassing moment of my softball playing days.

I think I had built myself up so much and when I failed to accomplish my playing goals all that frustration that I have been playing with all season long came to a head and I called it quits.

I don’t like thinking of myself as a quitter, in fact I’m quite ashamed. I feel embarrassed that I will have to face my teammates at work tomorrow and possibly have to explain my actions.

In the end though I have to look inward and dig deeper into myself. I have developed a new philosophy recently that the only person you can ever truly count on is yourself, everyone else will fail you at some point in your life. The truth is even sometimes you will fail yourself. You won’t be mentally all there or your physical ability just isn’t enough on any given day.

Well today I failed myself, physically I wasn’t strong enough or fast enough to beat out the groundballs and mentally I didn’t see the ball well enough to hit it and I just thought about average and proving myself as a success….

All I proved was today, I gave up too easily and I accepted failure too quickly…

Then I realized as the day progressed that failure is a part of success. If you don’t know what it’s like to be a failure then you never know what it feels like to truly succeed. As a fat person who has never been very good at athletics I know what it’s like to be a failure, by the end of this year I plan on finally being the best athlete I have ever been and finally getting to truly feel like I am a success. By the end of this year there will be a new and improved Shawn and this day will be a stepping stone on my own personal path of success.