How I Got Over My Fear Of Failure…

Falling not failing. I have a new yoga teacher. She is a willowy blonde goddess, improbably flexible and radiant in all ways. She is also funny and nice, goddamn it. My posse of yoga girls and I have a bit of a girl crush, as we try and emulate her grace and strength. Last night she had us trying some fiendishly difficult arm balances (Parsva Bakasana if you are interested). Demonstrating this asymmetrically balance effortlessly, a picture of poise right down to her perfectly pointed toes, she encouraged us to follow. “How hard can it be?” we muttered trying to get to grips with it. Pretty hard as it turns out. We persevered, the sound of the chilled yoga tunes almost entirely drowned out by the noise of arses and foreheads hitting the floor. Annoying. Difficult. Tiring. Hot. Very easy to give up and put it in the Too Hard Basket. Just wait it out till she moves onto the next pose. But then? But then she says this: “Keep falling. I love it when people fall. It means you are committed.” Oh, lady that is good. You don’t just have beautiful arms but much wisdom too. I think this is a core principle for life. If we could love falling more we would all go further and do more. The fear of falling stops so many of us from trying things that could be amazing, if only we would accept it was going to be harder than we thought, take longer than we thought and we probably will fall… Read more