The Biggest Failure

I might not be the right person to talk about failure. 
When your life has revolved a lot around staying in your comfort zone and being a bookie, you don't encounter the type of failure must people face.

I have always passed examinations I take, and a lot of times with scores that are beyond my expectations. I used just 3 weeks to study for my Oracle Database Administration certification exam and passed with a 100% score. I owe most of that to the exam dumps though, but that has always been my reality. I do extremely well and I can point to something as giving me the extra help. I spent less than 2 months to study for Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) and passed with 973/1000. I owe it to working in a company that gave me all the freedom and big monitor that made reading ebooks easy. The Mobil Scholarship I got while in the university, I was among the ones feeling bad after the exam. I saw too many easy questions I got wrong. And even at university exams, I was occasionally surprised by some of my good results. And at secondary school, I had cleared both my WAEC (with Bs & Cs) and NECO (with all distinctions) before I was 14 years old.

And the benefits of working a technical job is you get praised too often when you are the fix-it guy. People make you look like you won a brain lottery and immune to failure. Unfortunately, they were all setting me up for a bigger and hard to detect failure.

We are like ships. Our value is meant to shine on high seas and while braving storms. Not built to cruise the calm waters or stay in the dock for life. Lack of failure is the biggest failure. It shows that you stuck to calm waters. You stayed where you felt safe and comfy.

I am one of those people who could get by happily with little and expect nothing from anyone. I like to stay in the shadows and leave no trace. So I have no ambition, just lucky to be hardworking. That's why I avoid building strong friendships. I don't want people believing in me more than I believe in myself. I don't want the pressure of high expectations or any expectations. I feel safer when considered as socially unreliable than as a great always there friend. So I have pretty much worked myself into a corner where it's almost impossible to fail. No expectations. No big goals. No ambition. Just to work hard at the things I love with little regard to the outcome.

I don't consider it bad to do only the things you love. But if one sticks too much to his own cosy corner and limit himself to easy waters, then all his success will deny him the essence of genuine living. Which is the biggest failure.