Ask, Try, Fail and Learn.

So a couple of humbling experiences this week.  It's lead me to a new motto - Ask, Try, Fail, and Learn.  It's something that we do so infrequently, perhaps pride or fear gets in the way.

Experience #1: Learning a hobby in a different language.
Learning photography from someone who only speaks Mandarin (or any other language foreign to you, for that matter) can be the most frustrating and fascinating experiences of your life.  It happened to me yesterday.  A friend of my dad's owns and operates a chain of photography studios in Taipei.  One of his main photographers was kind enough to help me with a one hour lesson on portrait photography.  Now my Mandarin is not terrible, but it's not up to the level where I could understand everything he was saying to me.  Though he was patient, I could see some frustration from the instructor.  Frustration was brewing on my end too, not towards him, but anger towards myself for not being able to understand better.  


Experience #2: Navigating a new city.
Taiwan is a small city in comparison to a New York or a London.  It has one of the best transportation systems in the world in my opinion with an expansive underground transit network that rivals even those cities.  And even though the system is multi-lingual, it is still easy to get lost.  For someone who is pretty good with directions, I've found myself in a couple of situations here now with missing stops, asking for directions and just looking plain foolish each time I exit the wrong gate.


Experience #3: Making friends.
Having no friends in the city, it's been tough meeting people and finding people that can speak English.  Don't get me wrong, I want to practice Mandarin, but there's nothing more comforting than being able to converse with like minded people.  On a few occasions I've tried to strike up conversations with people in coffee shops or restaurants, and they have failed.  It's probably because I never had to do that when I was back in Toronto with friends accompanying me everywhere.


All of these three experiences have humbled me.  Failing at something isn't the end of it, it's an opportunity to learn and to improve.  I've been either too proud or too scared of asking people for help before that it feels even more awkward when it doesn't work out.  Confidence bruised, I've got to keep reminding myself of what you were told as a child - try, try again.


I also have to remind myself that it's only been a week and a half since I've been here.  Patience is something I've always struggled with, so I need to remind myself that these things take time.  This cycle of Asking, Trying, Failing and Learning is not an instantaneous action.  


As a matter of inspiration, Ask, Try, Fail, Learn is my March 13th entry in my one line a day journal.  Bookmarked.