Screwing Up

I was watching "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch (very inspiring btw) when he made a comment about screwing up. He said that one time when he was young and on a football team, the coach kept pushing him and riding him and making him do push ups for not performing, etc. Afterwards, one of the assistant coaches came to him and told him that it was a good thing--it meant that the coach thought he was worth the trouble. Then Randy said, "When you're screwin' up and no one is saying anything anymore, that means they gave up."

This comment struck me forcibly. I wrote the quote down but I don't know why. I thought at first that it was a reminder to myself that it's ok to screw up as long as I keep trying so that others want to continue to help me better myself. But it wasn't until today that I realized that, no, the comment wasn't directed towards me.

What I discovered today was that it was directed towards my relationship with someone else. I didn't realize this other person was screwing up until today when I finally gave up.

The quote then made sense to me.

The assumption, though, is that giving up is a bad thing. I don't believe that for a moment. Giving up means letting go of expectations. I don't know what will come out of this "giving up." My relationship with this person will definitely change, but the question is, "how?" Will it survive? Oddly enough, the giving up part makes it easy to be at peace with the possibility that it won't survive. And I suspect it won't survive.