Try

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This post is over 2 years old. A lot has changed since then! Take these words with a grain of salt and some patience with past me, who no longer exists.

I tie my self-worth to what I do and whether I succeed. I call this the “Do or do not, there is no try” philosophy.1

But I can spend all day doing without really trying. When it comes to my self-worth, the more important philosophy is simpler:

Try.

When I follow the “Do or do not” philosophy, I pin my self-worth to whether I did something or didn’t, however improbable the odds of success. I end up judging myself by things that are out of my control. When the odds aren’t in my favor, I become afraid to even begin.

When I try, I’m pushed to my limit, which isn’t always far enough to succeed.

In other words, I fail.

At so many things.

When I try and fail, I learn. When I learn, I get better.

Doing has never been the destination, but rather, the false means I’ve come up with to achieve a truer goal: to live with myself and love myself.

Trying never purports to be a destination, but it leads me… somewhere. It brings into focus my edges, the uncomfortable demarcations of territory where beyond is what I can be, but am not yet.

As my edges become clear, I can begin to truly know them: winding coastlines formed of insecurity, doubt. I can poke and prod them and find their soft spots. I can accept them and love them as parts of me, as integral as my skills or confidence or doings.

And I can keep pushing.

  1. Only a Sith deals in absolutes.↩