You're in a failure competition.

Have you ever walked into a room and forgot why you came? In doing so, physically or hypothetically, you entered a failure competition.

I recently entered a literal Failure Competition. Entrants write about their worst failure and submit it. The worst (or best) failure wins. A summary of mine; I pursued business to market my artwork. In 2015, I started that career by pitching a design to Vans. I spent long nights designing that pair of shoes, trying to paint my ideas faster than I could lose them. Making that passion into a career was no question for me. Since 2015, however; that pitch has been the height of my career because I have failed in doing anything else.

I became so attached to my classes, that I lost sight of why I enrolled as a marketing student in the first place. As this website proclaims, I am a creativity addict. I function best when my nails are covered in acrylic paint and the paint water is almost confused for coffee. I am incredibly stubborn and cannot imagine a future investing more in office supplies than paint brushes. I say this reasonably - I should have forfeit my 4.0. Building a career as an entrepreneur holds much greater implications for my future.

We all enter ourselves in a failure competition by keeping a narrow scope.

We spend hours at the gym (again), training harder for the body we've never been proud of.

We hustle to have a better life, but never enjoy the comfort that we've afforded ourselves or the children that we've hustled for.

And, yes, we walk into a room forgetting why we came.

Reaching the conclusion of failure was difficult, but now I am awake until 2AM most nights with a brush in hand. I care about my courses, as much as a gym-goer would care about their workout or a hard-working employee about their job, but they are not my focus.

I have dropped out of the failure competition. You should too.