I used to work for an afterschool program. When our director chose to pursue a new career, one of the site coordinators and I decided to start our own company and take over running the program. We had spoken to the superintendent of the school district and had several meetings in his office about this plan. The thing I remember most about his office – other than it being much too small for meetings – was the sign on his desk that read, “Always Make New Mistakes.” During our meetings the superintendent had agreed that the transition for the students and parents would be smooth since we were planning to run the new program in the same style as the current program. It seemed as if everyone was on board.
Involved in these meetings had been representatives from the city who ran a similar program with the parks department. The plan as I understood it was for them to supplement our program with sports activities and games run by their staff just as they had in the past. We spent the summer setting up the company structure, writing curriculum, and interviewing and hiring staff so we would be ready to go when the school year started. Every couple of weeks we would ask the superintendent to sign off on the program so we could access the grant funding and start purchasing supplies, but he never did. About two weeks before school started we really needed to order supplies, so we pressed for a response. We then received an email stating the school district would not be choosing us to run their afterschool program this school year. Instead, they would have the city run the entire program and we should clear out. When we called the superintendent, intending to ask, “What the heck?” the answer we got from his secretary was he was out of town, on vacation, in the mountains, and could not be reached.
How cowardly was this man? He couldn’t tell us to our faces he was not going to allow us to run the program? We were certainly a couple of tough ladies but not particularly intimidating. Looking back, we realized the people over at the city had known the whole time. They had meetings with us and pretended to write down dates and times for events, class schedules, and future meetings, all the while they were smugly planning to run the program themselves. Simply telling us the truth two months earlier would have saved us and so many others so much frustration. We spent the entire summer preparing and we had about 60 people ready to start working. All of those people could have been out finding other jobs had they known we would not be able to provide one.
*sigh* Sometimes we fail. It’s ok. It happens. If you fail make sure you know you did everything you could to succeed. You didn’t make an excuse. You didn’t blame someone else. You gave it your all and you still didn’t win. Learn from the mistake, forgive yourself, and go make new mistakes.
The painting class you have been rescheduling. A new restaurant you keep staring into every time you pass by. Whatever it is, stop making up reasons to put it off and try something new. What you choose might not work out. You may discover you hate painting or the restaurant is revolting, but you will have tried. Even if an experience turns out to be a terrible disaster, at least you had the experience. Having an experience gives you an opportunity to learn and to grow. Doing nothing gives you nothing, but a chance for regret.