Failure: An Identity or An Event?

Setiya - Chapter 4: Failure

Aerika (Quinny) VanDerSlik (H03)

    Failure is something that everyone is familiar with, whether it be failing a homework assignment or failing a class. Not all failures are big or small; not all are life-changing events. However, when the word failure pops up, people cannot help but think of themselves as failures instead of failure being one small event in their lives. Kieran Setiya's main concentration on failure is that we think of people as failures; failures have become labels in our society instead of events.  Due to it becoming a label, some will wear failure like a mask; it truly becomes a part of their identity, whether it comes from others calling them a failure or thinking they are. 

    In the book Life is Hard: How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way, Setiya mentions how some of the most dignified failures are in sports. The examples he uses are about baseball; he says that the greatest failure of them all might have been Ralph Branca. His failure was one filled with dignity, and his throw was the one that allowed Bobby Thomas to steal the game on October 3rd, 1951: "Shot Heard 'Round the World." Branca claims that he was remembered for that pitch, which led him to be infamous instead of famous, as others would say. Now, he did not let this failure take over him; he remained friends with Thomas after the event and continued on with his life; he failed with dignity, which is the best way to fail. 

    When discussing failure, it can be hard to reach a consensus on what makes it a failure; Setiya claims, "Failure is so prodigious, so multiform, so widespread that it's impossible to survey it comprehensively" (LH p. 93). For Setiya, failure is typically mundane; he gives the example of how he failed his driver's test twice and passed on the third try due to his father-in-law telling him of his own driving failures. One of the failures he tells Setiya about is how he had to drive his date home in reverse due to the car getting stuck in that gear. Setiya himself was only able to drive his wife to the hospital to give birth because she was in the car; he only had his permit at the time!! Not all failures need to be life-changing or dreadful; they can be ordinary everyday things that can be used to help others reflect or laugh. Looking at other's failures can help a lot; for example, when going into something new, I tend to ask one of my family members for advice so I know what to avoid; this way, I can learn from any of their mistakes. 

    When thinking of failure as a label, it can easily be brushed off. Others can see one failure and blow it out of proportion, but the way one thinks of one's own life should not be based on one's failures. One example is portrayed in LH with a quote from Joe Moran about Leonardo da Vinci; Moran claims that da Vinci was someone "who neither learnt from his failures nor wished to learn" (p. 92). Leonardo da Vinci is now known worldwide for being a great thinker. He may have had shortcomings in his artistic skills to some, but he is not known for being a failure. So, while one might see one aspect of another's life as a defining moment, it is not the only defining factor of someone. Being a failure has become common in society; today, it truly is an identity for some; parents might push their children to succeed so much that their children fear one failure will define them. 

    One of Setiya's main regrets is treating life as a project. It was as if there were a series of steps he needed to check off, one after the other. There was always an end, something that needed to be done, and after that, more tasks would appear. Doing so filled his life with many frustrations, and his present life felt empty. He was always looking towards the future, always seeing his past mistakes, but he never was looking at the present. When talking about this, he mentions two types of activities: telic and atelic. What is telic and atelic? Well, telic is an activity with an end; you go from Point A to Point B, and there is a clear end. Atelic is the opposite; they have no limit to them; you can stop doing them, but "they do not aim at termination, a final state in which they have been achieved" (LH p. 106). According to Setiya, these activities are the ones we need to focus on.

    Telic activities can have a similar concept as atelic for certain ones; an example in LH was walking home; by adding 'home,' there is an end to the activity. However, walking can be atelic; you can walk with no destination or end in mind, but you can stop the activity; it has no outcome or true end. Why focus your life on tasks with a clear fail or success? Setiya says we should concentrate on atelic activities as they make us less vulnerable to fate. 

    Another key example Setiya talks about is Myshkin, a character from The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky. He mentions that Myshkin lives a beautiful life and that even with his many failures, he isn't defined by them. Now, he does fail many times throughout the story, but he goes about them all the same. He tries to do what he considers correct, no matter the outcome he is presented with. His actions rarely do turn out the way he wants them to. However, even with all of these failures and these events, he still lives as well as he can. Setiya does agree that "If someone called Myshkin a failure, they would not be wrong, exactly, but they would miss the point" (LH p.105). The point is that is not the way to think of his life. Instead, one must think of the effort he put into each action he did. 

    Myshkin put effort into achieving each task; he cared about the process of getting to the endpoint, and he cared about what was right just as much as the end result. While the book was not written with a linear arc, Dostoevsky makes a point. He argues that value lies in the process, not the project. So, is focusing on the process more important than the endpoint? Not entirely. Setiya agrees that the process is essential but can not wholly ignore the outcome. The outcome matters; it is just that when we focus ONLY on the outcome, we fail to see the present moment; therefore, we have set ourselves up for failure. 

    So, failure matters; it is just that Setiya wants us to find a way not to let it define us, to not allow it to consume our very being and become us. We must find a way to make failure less central to our lives. While we cannot eliminate failure entirely, we can learn to live alongside it. One example is to take our failures and learn from them, see where along the way things went downhill, and adjust. Make that failure a small event in life, move past it, and continue. 

    While we can fail to live, the best way to avoid that is to live in the present, not think solely of the outcome of one's life. Pay attention to what is currently occurring; just live. Failure does not have to be an identity; you have to be the one to change how you see yourself. If so, adjust and adapt. 

    Discussion Questions:

• Has our society always thought of others as failures as if it is an identity?
• What can be done to avoid failure becoming a key point in our lives? What do you do to lessen the feeling of failure?
• How does failure feel to you? Is it possible to survey it comprehensively? 
• What are some atelic activities you enjoy that might allow you to live more in the present?