There is Try

There are many philosophies in this world. Some are arcane and have but a few faithful followers. Others are nearly ubiquitous and cover the walls of every hipster hangout in the land. Some are benign, little more than positive thinking. Others are so obviously wrong that few but the true zealots ever give them a second look.

Then there are those that are especially dangerous; they sound true, and we want them to be true, but they aren’t.

In one of the more memorable lines from the Star Wars franchise, Yoda, the Jedi master training Luke Skywalker in the ways of the Force, says:

Try not! Do or do not! There is no try!

It sounds good, right? Trying is usually associated with failure, and if you think you might fail, there’s a higher likelihood that you will. So do. Don’t try.

It’s catchy. It fits on a coffee mug. It makes you feel good.

There’s just one problem.

There is try.

Do or do not eliminates failure. You either succeed, or you do nothing.

Doing nothing isn’t failure. It’s inaction. There’s a huge difference.

Failure is a part of life. We all fail. History is replete with stories of men and women who tried to do noble, glorious things, and failed.

But they tried.

My favorite is Thomas Edison’s effort to create the incandescent light bulb.

He tried many times to find the right combination of materials, each failing to achieve his goal.

He tried. Over and over and over and over, until he finally found the solution.

But some people never do find that solution. They try and try and never succeed.

I don’t believe that effort is wasted.

Even in failure, we are forged, tempered, transformed.

If we let God have His way in us.

Because we are not put here to succeed or fail.

We are here to become.

Some of us become through hardship and trials.

Some of us become through failure.

Some of us become through finally scaling that mountain you never thought you could climb.

Some of us become through the realization that the journey is more important than the destination.

I don’t think the intention of the quote was to breed inactivity. I think it’s meant to be inspirational. Perhaps you’ve been motivated by it yourself.

But think of the failures in your life. They really do matter. Saying they mean nothing is counterproductive. If you hadn’t failed, you would be a different person.

So try. Try hard. Do your best.

But know that if you fail, it still means something. Think on this quote when you fail:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Theodore Roosevelt

Try, my friends. Strive valiantly. Find something worth doing and try. If it’s truly worth doing, you’ll fail. Keep trying.

And pay attention to the failures. Don’t just sweep them under the rug and pretend they didn’t happen. Learn from them. Let God speak to you in defeat. You might find those times more meaningful than cheap success. They are certainly more meaningful than doing nothing.

There is try.