My twin daughters turned 18 last week and eagerly headed off for their driver’s license test. One passed and one failed.
This is a much more confronting experience than when a single child fails – aside from the obvious comparison issues, there is the difficulty of celebrating for the one who passes (because she doesn’t want to make her twin feel bad), and the inner conflict for the one who fails: part of her wants to congratulate her twin and the other part is feeling envy, misery, embarrassment…
I would like to acknowledge my daughter Emma for her generosity and courage in allowing me to share her story so publicly. Her nerves failed her during the test resulting in a handbrake start and stalling twice, and that was enough to fail her in the test. She was initially devastated as she had been so looking forward to the freedom and independence of having her own license ever since her elder brother achieved his, and of course the pain was worse watching her twin sister drive off on her own while she still required a supervising driver.
But since my girls have grown up with the principle of Divine Order, Emma was aware of the need to go looking for the benefits in failure, and since she was having trouble with this exercise on her own, she agreed to have a session with a Demartini Facilitator, and the result was this text message to me: “I’ve just put failing my driving test into my ‘good things of 2013’ jar.”
Thank you, Tanya Cross, a wonderful Counselor of Wisdom who spent an hour on Skype with Emma. The result was this inspiring list of benefits:
Reasons why I’m grateful for failing my test!
A chance to grow
Develop patience
Develop resilience
Develop strength
Develop persistence/determination
Some separation from Lesley/have different experiences
More time to prepare
Better understanding of depression, grief, disappointment, anger
Have the experience of not having everything just fall into my lap
Be able to share my experience with others and give advice
Save some money
Learn how to control and deal with my nerves
Give mum a bit longer to drive me around 😛
Develop relationship with mum
Continue having to ask for what I want eg. ask for lifts
Learn from my mistakes to become a better driver
Learn how to pick myself up when I fall, with dignity and self respect
I now know that I can survive anything
I can depend on myself to take care of myself/work things out on my own
Learn how to confide in others to learn from them and accept comfort, advice and help
Be more grateful of where in my life I have freedom and independence
Have a greater sense of satisfaction/accomplishment/gratitude when I do get it
To finally understand the power of the mind and the universe
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