I have a box full of broken boards. Some of those boards have blood on them. For years and years, I persevered, until I didn’t. On that day I failed.

The boards are wrapped in lengths of cloth. I fought for those bits of cloth, I bled for them. Those bits of cloth are my belts. White, orange, green stripe, green, blue stripe, blue, red stripe, red, brown. These days brown would be black stripe, but back then it was brown.

There is no black on that list.

Along the way, I blew out my knee. I came back after that. It took a year, but then my doctor cleared me. I had been about to test for my black belt when it happened. The process was long and hard. I had to wear a knee brace, walked with a cane for a long time. I pushed and pushed and pushed.

My training was slow at first, but I picked up. I started training more, re-dedicated myself, fought through the pain.

After many months of pushing my body, I was there, I was ready. There was a black belt test scheduled and I was going to be one of the candidates. Then I got the word, my surgery was scheduled for the week before the black belt test.

Well, I had a choice… wait maybe months, maybe years, before my next surgery window, or put off my black belt test. I chose the surgery and missed the test.

I went back. For a while I couldn’t walk, then I reached the point where I could walk slowly, with a cane. More physiotherapy. I joined a regular gym and went every second day, building up my strength, building up my muscles. I fought through it, and I came back to Taekwondo.

Training was hard. The biggest hurdle was my fitness. I didn’t have nearly the physical abilities I had before my injury. My stamina wasn’t there anymore. Cardio was a constant challenge. I still kept going though, kept training.

I got hurt. I got hurt a lot.

There were some personal things as well. My girlfriend and I had started training together. She was still there, but she wasn’t my girlfriend anymore. It was my fault, I was a terrible partner and I did some things that weren’t forgivable. Still, I kept trying.

Finally, I realized that I didn’t have it in me anymore. I quit. I tried another school, it wasn’t what I was looking for. It was Taekwondo, what I got from my old school was martial arts. Also, I kept getting injured. Trying to train at the level I used to before my knee injury. It didn’t work and I racked up more injuries.

I stopped going. It was never a formal decision, I just stopped going. I got fat.

A couple of years later I went back. I decided to try again. Most of the people I had trained with before were either gone or had moved up to black belt. People who I mentored when they started because I was already red or brown belt were now black belts and I was still a brown belt. That was okay though, not a big deal. They were nice, kind, happy to have me back.

I pushed too hard, tried too hard. The way it works in that school (and in most) is that the higher belts stand at the front of the class and the lower belts stand to the back. The idea is that the lower belts can watch what the higher belts are doing, but it’s also a rank and respect thing. I wanted to look good, I wanted to be perfect. I got winded before the lowest belts in the class though. My cardio wasn’t there.

Then I broke my nose sparring. The picture on my profile? It was taken that night.

I went back a couple of times after that, but I wasn’t really in it anymore. Finally, I stopped going completely. That was more than a year ago.

I’m still a brown belt. I earned that belt and I will have it for the rest of my life. If I don’t go back though, if I have given up? That’s when I have officially failed.

That’s the thing with most of life. You haven’t failed until you quit or you die. So long as you are alive, so long as you are able to keep going, you haven’t failed. You might not have succeeded, but you haven’t failed.

Writing a novel was one of those things for me. I tried and tried and tried. I failed every time, until the time I didn’t and my novel was finished. Then I edited it and designed a cover and put it up on Amazon. It’s there right now. It didn’t make me rich, but it’s a novel that exists in the world. I have a bunch of copies in my living room.

Making a living as a writer is like that. I don’t make a living at it, not yet. I may not… but I will keep trying, and so long as I keep trying I haven’t failed as a writer. I keep making more money that way, slowly, inch by inch, I get closer. Sure, it needs a huge distance from where I am, but that’s fine. I make a living creating web apps for now, maybe for the rest of my life, but slowly writing makes up a little more of my income, starts to at least pay for itself.

So yeah, I haven’t failed as a writer. I haven’t failed as a novelist. I’m not dead and there’s a good chance I will go back and try to get my black belt again, so I haven’t failed at that either.