“There is no failure in sports”, Giannis Antetokunmpo (NBA star player) replied to a journalist during a post game interview, a few months ago. The quote immediately sparked conversations and statements, mostly positive between the media and the fans worldwide. It made me ponder as well. Is there failure in life?
Of course there is. In life and in sports. In any aspect and in any activity that there is a goal set, someone will fail and someone will succeed. We are raised in our culture with the mentality of the winner. The first is who matters and he is celebrated. The second might be mentioned. The third? Usually forgotten. Do this test to find out for yourselves. Try to remember who were the people in the mission of the Apollo 11 to the moon? Right away the name of Neil Armstrong pops up. I need a couple of seconds for Buzz Aldrin. And the third? I ask myself was there a third? Yes. But who? I can’t remember. I have to look it up. Yes, there was a third individual, and his name is Michael Collins. He remained in orbit while the other two landed on the lunar surface. Was he less successful, had he failed because he isn’t mentioned as often as the other two? Certainly not.
In life we set goals all the time. From simple tasks, to complicated life goals. Either when we try to learn a new language or to get ourselves into college there is always success and failure. There are a lot of different criteria and circumstances many times beyond our control that play a significant and often a determining role to the outcome of our efforts. Winning and succeeding are two different things that we often tend to treat them as one and the same. Many times success isn’t to win, and winning doesn’t make you successful. For years our western civilization celebrated the win at all costs. “The end justifies the means”, as it is often mentioned. What is the point to win and learn nothing? I ask myself. I feel that this concept of winning mentality, creates an hysteria around it, that carries no actual gain.
On a personal note, I carry multiple failures with pride in my life. I failed to be a full time actor, or a paid theater director, or a published writer or a globally renowned artist. Those were all aspirations that I had for a specific passage of time. I failed to fulfill them. But I succeeded in trying them and learning in the process valuable lessons about myself and other human beings. And of course I had fun and carry no regrets. Every decision was consciously made.
But to go back to the initial quote. Why there isn’t any failure in sports? In sports we give the credit to the winner, and rightly so. The winner achieved the goal that is to finish in the first place. And that is what all the other teams and players strived for too. That doesn’t make them failures in the way that we charge the word failure with its meaning. Because the goal is to compete, to improve, to play and learn the game, to enjoy any talent that is given to us, to fulfill any expectation that we have for ourselves, and finally just to be there. Like Michael Collins was. Be present in our own personal myth, in our own destiny.
