Letting My Kids Fail

Spring of my eighth grade year. Cheerleading tryouts. I wasn’t athletic. My hand-eye coordination was iffy. And learning steps to a routine? Forget about it.

But I tried out anyway.

Looking back, I marvel at my confidence. I mean my rhythm has always been questionable. I’ll never forget performing the dance routine for the judges wondering why the girls in my group weren’t keeping time with the music like me.

I knew my name was going to show up on the roster. But it didn’t. I was cut. I tried. I failed.

But I was no failure.

My momma consoled. She loved. She supported. She encouraged. She helped me face my inadequacies. She didn’t say the judges made a mistake. She didn’t run up to the school demanding a second try.

Instead? The most painful thing she could have done—The best thing she could have done. She let me hurt. She let me fail.

And I’m grateful.

I didn’t make the team, but I slowly discovered my niche. I’m better for the struggle.

As a momma myself, I’ve realized I must let my children fail. It sounds counter-intuitive. Ridiculous even. It goes against every momma-gut feeling I have.

Because I ache to think of their pain. My role as mom is to protect Ella and Caleb from hurt. To shield them from loss. To guard their tender psyches from the devastation of failing.

Right?

But what if I’m wrong? What if our children need to fail?

Is our goal as parents to raise winners? Or is it to raise children who know how to rise above their struggles and failure?

If I want my children to be able to get back up and dust the dirt off after a fall, I must teach them how to do that—how to get back up. If I never allow them to fail as children, they may never rise above failure as adults.

But it’s. so. hard!

I’ll never forget the day my Ella was riding her bike. She was just a little-bit, maybe four or five. She raced down a small hill only to crash and burn. Through salty tears and some scratched-up hands, my husband sat her back on the bike.

He cheered. He encouraged. He applauded. He forced her to get back up.

With tears running down her sweet face, and with this momma’s heart squeezed tight, she raced back down the hill. She conquered her defeat. Then? Sweet-holy-moment, she raced back up the hill to do it again. And again.

She had fallen, but my Prince Charming taught her how to get back up. He taught her it was okay to fail. He taught her how to keep from being a failure.

Because the difference between failing and failure is the ability to stand up and brush ourselves off.

I’m in my 12^th year of teaching. I see it everyday. Straight A’s. Football team captains. Student government presidents. These accolades do not define success. The students who have been taught to deal with their failings, their weaknesses? These are the hardest workers, the ones advocating for their own future.

A successful child is the one who has been taught how to face adversity, to work hard, to climb high on her own. Because let’s face it momma—the world is a scary place. I can’t follow my children around with elbow pads and five-point harnesses.

But I can teach my children how to stand back up when they don’t make the team. To learn from their mistakes. To take responsibility for their actions. To fail…