Summer of Small Victories

This summer, I decided to tell the undergrads that we would call this summer “The Summer of Small Victories.” This was mostly because we did not accomplish very much on the day to day, and there were more failures than successes in the lab.

So then we had to find a way to celebrate something.

Therefore, “The Summer of Small Victories”

It is very important to recognize the moments when we succeed, even if those successes are not necessarily the ones we expected.

Learning that something is NOT what we expected does not mean it is bad. It just means that what we thought is not the reality. We may not have confirmed our hypothesis, but we can say we learned something. We can say we learned what doesn’t work, what could go better, what we could learn, etc.

There were many other small victories that I have experienced this summer, so allow me to share some of my #ThatsGold moments of the summer.

But I’ll have you know, they don’t look like victories at first

1. I gained weight

Just like any other girl, I was pretty disappointed with the number on the scale. I weight train, eat right, and do everything in my power to be the healthiest I can be (minus sleep, but we’re working on it!)

However, the number on the scale was not a reflection of poor health. In fact, it was a sign that I was getting stronger. Muscle weighs more than fat, and let me tell you, once you really get in to a groove with the weights and eat enough protein, you gain muscle pretty quick.

What I thought was a setback was actually an indicator of my improvements.

But the real moment that proved that this weight gain was good was when I went to leg day, and I outlifted a guy by 80 pounds. (Should I mention he was a lacrosse player?) The look on his face was priceless, and I came to the realization that while I may not be a stick person, it is far more impressive and satisfying to see the pure shock on a man’s face when you outlift him. I definitely felt more confident in myself after that moment.

2. I spent a lot of money on food

Again, it is not smart to spend too much money. So I decided one day to try to bargain shop a little more, and I bought more standards instead of the ingredients I had been buying for my meals.

I lost a lot of energy, and I felt pretty gross. It turns out that the money I was spending buying fresh meat and other high protein foods actually was worth the payout. By eating higher quality foods, I did not have to snack as much, which meant I actually spent less in the long run.

3. I wasted 60 dollars on an unneccessary road trip

At the end of July, I decided to drive up to Chicago to go to Trader Joe’s (because there isn’t one in South Bend), and then go straight back to Notre Dame. Due to the unneccessarily high toll road prices, I ended up spending more money driving than I should have.

However, I learned that I was able to roadtrip on my own, and I knew that I would have the endurance to surprise my family the next weekend! The small financial loss was a good sign that I was able to handle a big emotional boost by seeing my family before classes started.

4. My experiment failed in the exact same way it did last summer

Yes, my images were terrible at the beginning, but I was able to trouble shoot. Additionally, I was able to bounce the issue off on my undergrads, which gave them an opportunity to practice trouble shooting as well.

(I apologize Dear Readers, but I will probably talk about them a lot. They’re the most interesting and amazing kids.)

Oh, and by the end of the summer, I got 1 picture!

Small victory indeed.

See, there are many moments in life when we think we failed utterly, but the truth is that our failures are actually a pathway towards success. The problem that we face in society is that we think that every failure is waste. We think that by making mistakes that we move further away from our ultimate goal. So we attempt to fix what we did wrong by doing the same thing over and over and over again.

But if we choose to learn from our mistakes, if we celebrate the small victories in the midst of the losses, then maybe we can start to find new ways to come to a conclusion.

Even if that means completely starting over.

Check out this Ted Talk about how Google uses this concept.

Here’s a nice example: when I was in Organic Chemistry, my professor would have us work in pairs at the chalkboard. We would all be trying to figure out how to draw a certain mechanism. Now, there are many common mistakes made in these problems, and instead of simply telling us what they are, she would walk around the room and wait for it to happen.

“Thank you!” she would say. 

That’s when you knew you got the answer wrong. However, instead of leaving the student feeling frustrated and stuck, our professor would help the entire class work through the common error. This had a substantial impact on our overall understanding of mechanisms, and it actually gave the class an odd sense of comraderie.

Imagine if we celebrated the small mistakes of those around us and helped them find the small victories underneath?

I know I would not have seen this summer’s small victories if it were not for the guy at the gym, the number of events I could attend with my friends once I ate better, the smiles of my siblings, or the help of my undergrads.

So celebrate the setbacks.

Find your small victories.

You got this.