One could blame others, or sink into self-recrimination. The Middle Way seeks equanimity: to take responsibility while recognizing what lies beyond control. One conversation did not define me. One setback did not determine my future. One failure did not make me a failure.

 

By George Cassidy Payne

Several years ago, I fumbled a second-round interview for a position that could have let me devote my life to something I loved.

Within the first few moments, a few missteps derailed everything. By the time I left, a committee member said I had “recovered nicely,” but I already knew: the stakes were too high, and I had blown it.

Driving home, the economic cost hit first. 45 seconds of conversation had cost me $70,000 in next year’s salary, and perhaps a million over a tenured career. Compare that to the $2,500 I earned per course as a visiting adjunct, and the loss churned my stomach like a damp sweatshirt caught in the spokes of a roaring Harley.

At first, I blamed everything and everyone.

Perhaps the questions weren’t fair. Perhaps they hadn’t given me enough time. How could they not see I was the one for the role?

I tried loftier explanations: maybe it was God’s plan, some higher purpose hidden in the missed opportunity. Even that felt hollow. Then I tried Fate: the stars weren’t aligned, the room too bright, the hour inconvenient. Why couldn’t it be like the first round? I had aced that one.

Eventually, the blame game exhausted itself. I remembered a teaching from Marcus Aurelius: “You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” I could not control the committee, the questions, or the room, but I could own my response. Freedom is not about claiming credit when things go well; it is about owning the moments when they do not.

The Buddhist Middle Way offered another lens.

One could blame others, or sink into self-recrimination. The Middle Way seeks equanimity: to take responsibility while recognizing what lies beyond control. One conversation did not define me. One setback did not determine my future. One failure did not make me a failure.

I had failed.

It was not the committee. Not the room. Not the hour. Not God. I had failed.

And in that failure, I found freedom. I was free because I alone was responsible. I could clutch it, or I could let it go, but I could not blame anyone or anything else if I wished to remain free. True liberty comes with the weight of responsibility; we are free only when we respond fully and without evasion.

In retrospect, it was a missed opportunity. I have not taught since, and a part of my life that I loved is missing. But that failure led me to counseling, to domestic violence advocacy, and suicide prevention work.

As Thich Nhat Hanh reminds us, “No mud, no lotus.” That failure, though painful, became the soil from which new paths bloomed. I am a different person than I was then, and in many ways, a better one.

Perhaps life’s cruelest—and most important—irony is this: we have little say over our birth, our education, our fortunes, yet we must bear our failures alone.

 

Photo: Pixabay

Editor: Dana Gornall

 

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