Losing to succeed and thoughts on ice cream

As grandparents, my wife and I have two entirely different tacks when it comes to playing games with our grandchildren.

For me, I never win–they know they are going to win when they play against papa. My goal is to affirm them and let them experience winning.

Sonja takes a little different approach…she doesn’t mind them experiencing what it feels like to lose.

Honestly, Sonja’s approach probably pays more dividends, but it is much more painful at the moment.

I wish I had recordings of some of the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth that has come from my grandchildren as they lost yet again to Nana.

My grandchildren are a lot like some adults I’ve known: They’d rather win than succeed.

They’d rather paddle around in the shallow end of life than risk getting in over their heads. They’d rather play little inconsequential games than put in the sweat equity that is required to play in the big leagues.

We all have to battle this temptation.

Losing is never fun. Safe feels so…safe. Having piles of monopoly money is a lot more fun than taking the risk of investing our hard earned real sweat equity.

Think about it this way…

Just because you drop a cone of ice cream (a major loss in my book!), does that mean you never eat ice cream again? Of course not. And why would it be any different in any other area of life?

The ONE THING for today: Get out there my friend! Dare to dream big, go big, and believe big and yes…lose big. After all, the worse that can happen is that you learn something, and with each loss you’re getting closer to the win you’ve been looking for.

And, take time to enjoy some ice cream along the way…but that’s a story for another time.