I no longer resent that one and only exam I ever failed. It made me look like a normal human being. But more importantly, it taught me to pick myself up after falling, lick my wounds and return to the ring again. No amount of reading on Stoic philosophy, no wise mentor, could have taught me what the real experience of failing did.
I learnt that life carries on after a personal disaster, and looking backwards is not the solution. Reassessing one's option in the light of an unanticipated mishap, taking into account all factors, and deciding and carrying out the wisest course of action, is the way to proceed when one fails an exam or falls down a steep hill while hiking and clinging on desperately to the root of a tree to save one's own life (as happened to me once). All adversities in life can be turned to useful lessons to help us cope with future misfortunes.
By Lee Wei Ling, in "Turning adversities into useful lessons" (The Sunday Times, 11 Sep 2011)
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