A man, I greatly admire, compared fear of failure to a body builder whose afraid to lift weights. When we award a metal to everybody, because we’re afraid to disappoint, we’ve hollowed out the dumbbell. We don’t evaluate, learn, or grow unless we fail.
In Science News I discover thousands of new ideas, almost too yummy to stand, and almost every one is attributed to people not born in the USA. As I taught I asked my teens, year after year; if they could’ve been born with any skill what wonderful things would they love to do when they grew up. I eliminated failure but even then I always got the same answer, “Oh, probably accounting, to make a lot of money.” Now I don’t want to disparage accounting but no one DREAMS of it!
Then there’s John who, as a kid, made a pet of a water rat , ten years ago grounded a lightning rod in our bedroom (for an elaborate reason I didn’t understand at the time and can’t remember now), and yesterday said, “I don’t know anything; but can’t remember it.” One of my goals, in writing books for big and little kids, is to stretch minds.  nancymauerman.com