Failure

 I have started reading English Professor Joe Moran's If You Should Fail: A Book of Solace (Penguin / Viking, 2020). 

Moran elegantly debunks the idea that failure is often the necessary roadway to success. For all our motivational talk of growth mindsets, many failures are just that. Some matter little, some more. Failure and perceived failure are unavoidable facts of life.

Understood in context, Samuel Beckett's famous words: “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” are not perhaps as inspiring as has often been suggested. 

(Perhaps more on this as my reading progresses).