How to Fail and Win

In giving us a picture of his life story Scott Adams has also given us some valuable insights into success, failure and how they are interrelated.  Most people who are successful end up that way as a result of failing and then trying again repeatedly.  

And, you have to be willing to learn from failure as opposed to letting it paralyze you into inaction.  To do this Adams gives some very useful tips to remember including: 
"Goals are for losers.  Systems are for winners."
"Passion is bull.  What you need is personal energy." 
"A combination of mediocre skills can make you surprisingly valuable."

As an educator, one of the chapters that I liked the best in this book was titled "The Math of Success."  In it, Adams outlines a list of skills that every adult should have.  Among these he includes:

Public speaking
Psychology
Business writing
Accounting
Design
Conversation
Overcoming shyness
Persuasion
Proper grammar
Proper voice technique

Think of the opportunity we all have as parents and educators to teach these skills and think of the benefit to our children and students.  And, educators should recognize that we don’t have to teach these skills instead of our regular content.  We can teach them with our regular content.  Or, if we could get students interested in learning anything we could teach those skills with that interest.  

As Adams points out it is not being great at any one of these that usually spells success but being pretty good at a combination of them.  Imagine if these skills were taught in every course a student took in school.  If every class supported these skills, even in just a small way, we could be graduating students who were articulate, engaging, interesting.  Remarkable even.  Isn't that what we want for our students? 

I think another lesson Adams' book reminds us of is that we have to be willing to fail and embrace that.  Make the most of these inevitable occurrences.  Unfortunately, our schools do not embrace this mindset of dealing with failure.  Instead, failure is to be scorned and avoided at all costs.  But the ultimate cost of avoiding failure may be to miss out on some solid chances for success.