Embracing Your Failure
In What the Best College Students, Ken Bain states that “People who become highly creative and productive learn to acknowledge their failures, even to embrace them, and to explore and learn from them” (Bain 100). Everyone fails at some point. Failure is common to all in any form of activity and it is good to recognize and accept it. One should learn how to embrace their failure rather than just seeing it as an obstacle to overcome.
I play piano. Sometimes while practicing, I mess up. When I was younger, I used to get so angry when I messed up. I would just give up. Now, I learn from mistakes. Sometimes, I even add my mistake to the song I am learning. When I play for fun, I always start out with a few simple chords. …show more content…
However, that isn’t the case. Bain states, “If they don’t succeed, they look for new strategies rather than deciding they ‘just can’t do it’” (Bain 108). Learning how to play piano was very challenging. I was told that if I knew how to read music, it would be easy. Being that I was in band and was taught how to read music, I was eager to go learn how to play piano. My grandma had a piano in the living room. No one in my family could really play it. My cousins and I would mess around on it at every family gathering. However, I was determined to be the first one to play it and actually know what I was doing. One day, I printed out sheet music to “Amazing Grace”. I sat at the piano, and suddenly my mind went blank. I knew how to read music, but I wasn’t told which notes belonged to which keys. I got frustrated and gave up. The next day I went to my music teacher and asked him to teach me the notes on the piano. He taught me, but told me that it would takes lots of memorization and practice. After school I rushed to my grandma’s house. I thought that learning the piano would be easier now, …show more content…
My teacher was right. Though I knew the notes and keys, I would still have to memorize and practice them before I could play the song. Well, I practiced and practiced. However, it seemed as if I wasn’t getting better at all. I eventually gave up and figured that maybe piano wasn’t my calling. The next day in school, my teacher asked how it was going. I told him that I could not memorize the keys and I just gave up. He informed me of another technique I could use to learn to play the piano. He suggested that I learn to play by ear. You see, playing by ear just means that you could play without reading music. All you have to do was listen to a song, figure out what key it is in, and go on from there. At first it sounded kind of hard. I had to learn and memorize all twelve scales on the piano. Then, I had to learn the chords that went along with those scales. When I got to my grandma’s I started to learn them. It took some time to memorize them, but after about three weeks, I had them memorized. I was so happy. However, that was just step one. I then had to try to play by ear. I’ll never forget the day that I put on Ben King’s “Stand by Me” on my ipod and learned to play it. My life was complete. I had finally learned how to play
In What the Best College Students, Ken Bain states that “People who become highly creative and productive learn to acknowledge their failures, even to embrace them, and to explore and learn from them” (Bain 100). Everyone fails at some point. Failure is common to all in any form of activity and it is good to recognize and accept it. One should learn how to embrace their failure rather than just seeing it as an obstacle to overcome.
I play piano. Sometimes while practicing, I mess up. When I was younger, I used to get so angry when I messed up. I would just give up. Now, I learn from mistakes. Sometimes, I even add my mistake to the song I am learning. When I play for fun, I always start out with a few simple chords. …show more content…
However, that isn’t the case. Bain states, “If they don’t succeed, they look for new strategies rather than deciding they ‘just can’t do it’” (Bain 108). Learning how to play piano was very challenging. I was told that if I knew how to read music, it would be easy. Being that I was in band and was taught how to read music, I was eager to go learn how to play piano. My grandma had a piano in the living room. No one in my family could really play it. My cousins and I would mess around on it at every family gathering. However, I was determined to be the first one to play it and actually know what I was doing. One day, I printed out sheet music to “Amazing Grace”. I sat at the piano, and suddenly my mind went blank. I knew how to read music, but I wasn’t told which notes belonged to which keys. I got frustrated and gave up. The next day I went to my music teacher and asked him to teach me the notes on the piano. He taught me, but told me that it would takes lots of memorization and practice. After school I rushed to my grandma’s house. I thought that learning the piano would be easier now, …show more content…
My teacher was right. Though I knew the notes and keys, I would still have to memorize and practice them before I could play the song. Well, I practiced and practiced. However, it seemed as if I wasn’t getting better at all. I eventually gave up and figured that maybe piano wasn’t my calling. The next day in school, my teacher asked how it was going. I told him that I could not memorize the keys and I just gave up. He informed me of another technique I could use to learn to play the piano. He suggested that I learn to play by ear. You see, playing by ear just means that you could play without reading music. All you have to do was listen to a song, figure out what key it is in, and go on from there. At first it sounded kind of hard. I had to learn and memorize all twelve scales on the piano. Then, I had to learn the chords that went along with those scales. When I got to my grandma’s I started to learn them. It took some time to memorize them, but after about three weeks, I had them memorized. I was so happy. However, that was just step one. I then had to try to play by ear. I’ll never forget the day that I put on Ben King’s “Stand by Me” on my ipod and learned to play it. My life was complete. I had finally learned how to play