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Life > Experiences

It’s Okay to Fail

Delaney Chase
The opinions expressed in this article are the writer’s own and do not reflect the views of Her Campus.
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at SBU chapter.

When I was younger, my favorite thing to do was draw. I would do it for hours. Sketching something, hating it, ripping it up and starting over. Something that should have taken me ten minutes took an hour because it just was not good enough. When I would show my family, they would tell me how great it was, but I would not believe them and end up throwing the piece away anyway. 

All my life I thought I had to be perfect. Be the perfect child, get perfect grades, and be perfect in sports. This caused a lot of stress and pressure that I did not know how to handle. It led to a decrease in my self-confidence, and I started being less vocal and outgoing. I stopped participating in class out of fear that I would be wrong.

It was not until recently that I truly accepted the fact that you do not have to be perfect. You just have to be you. Our whole lives we have heard people say that nobody’s perfect, but sometimes it feels as if some people are pretty close. We all know that person who seemed like they could do no wrong. It could have been a classmate, teammate, friend, or even sibling. The truth is, they have their flaws just like everyone else. Comparing yourself to others can lead you to forget what makes you, you. Everyone has different strengths and differences. That is what makes us all so special. 

Making mistakes is just a part of life and a really important one. You can not truly be successful without knowing the feeling of failure. That feeling when you get rejected, you do not get the job, you miss the game-winning shot, or you fail a big test, is the reason you get back up and try again. Almost everyone who has ever succeeded at anything can tell you their story of failure. Bill Gates’ first company was a disaster and Walt Disney was told he lacked creativity. I have been playing basketball for a large portion of my life and an important quote I was told by my coach sticks with me to this day. Michael Jordan said, “I missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed.” 

Delaney Chase is the co-campus correspondent for the St. Bonaventure University Her Campus chapter. She works with the other campus correspondent and various board members to communicate with the rest of the Her Campus community as well as edit articles and lead weekly meetings. Delaney is a junior and is currently studying journalism and political science. She also is a writer for TAP into Greater Olean, an online news platform in the St. Bonaventure area, as well as a captain of the St. Bonaventure Women's Club Basketball team and Vice President of SBU for Equality. She enjoys hearing and sharing experiences with those of similar interests and enjoys being involved in different activities across the SBU campus. She finds this a great way to gain connections with those at her university and in nearby areas. She is enjoys the ability to gain experience and further her knowledge of the communications field. Outside of her time in school, Delaney loves listening to Taylor Swift and will take absolutely any opportunity to bring her up in conversation. She can often be found at the campus Starbucks with her friends ordering a pumpkin spice latte or brown sugar oat milk shaken espresso. She enjoys reading classic novels but also loves watching the trashiest reality TV shows.