As I said there is nothing wrong with failing. Pick yourself up

Host: The soft light of the café flickered as the evening deepened, casting warm shadows across the table where Jack and Jeeny sat. The world outside had begun to slow, the hum of city life becoming more distant as the day settled into night. Inside, the air was still, save for the gentle clink of cups and the quiet murmur of nearby conversations. Jeeny, always curious and eager to explore deeper ideas, broke the silence.

Jeeny: “I came across something Henry Kravis said that really resonated with me. He said, ‘As I said there is nothing wrong with failing. Pick yourself up and try it again. You never are going to know how good you really are until you go out and face failure.’” She paused, her eyes fixed on Jack. “What do you think about that? Do you think we really have to face failure in order to understand our true potential?”

Jack: He nodded, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. “I think he’s right. Failure is an unavoidable part of life, and as much as people try to avoid it, it’s actually a necessary part of growth. The real test is how you handle failure, how you respond to it. You don’t know how strong, how resilient, or how capable you are until you’ve been knocked down and had to pick yourself up. It’s in those moments of failure that you discover what you’re made of.” He paused, his voice growing more reflective. “Sometimes, people think that failure means they’re not good enough, but it’s actually a way to measure how much you’re willing to try again, how much you’re willing to push through.”

Host: The rain outside had started again, gentle but persistent, the soft sound creating a calming backdrop to their conversation. Jeeny’s gaze remained steady, but her expression had softened, her voice more contemplative now.

Jeeny: “That’s the hardest part, isn’t it? The response to failure. It’s easy to feel defeated, to think that if we fail, we’re not good enough. But what Kravis is saying is that we don’t actually know how good we are until we face failure head-on. We don’t know what we’re capable of until we push through those moments of self-doubt and uncertainty. It’s like failure is a kind of litmus test for how much we’re willing to grow.” She smiled gently, her tone reassuring. “It’s not about whether you fail, it’s about how you choose to move forward after you do.”

Jack: “Yeah, exactly,” he said, his voice gaining more certainty. “Failure doesn’t define you. It’s what you do afterward that shows who you are. If you’re willing to get back up, to keep going even when it feels impossible, that’s when you start to see just how much you’re capable of. I think people are afraid of failing because they think it’s the end, but it’s really just the beginning of learning, of growing. It’s only when we face failure that we truly discover what we can achieve.” He looked at Jeeny, a small smile crossing his lips. “Maybe we need to start seeing failure as more of a step than a setback.”

Jeeny: “That’s it,” she said softly, her voice filled with quiet understanding. “We think of failure as this thing to avoid, but it’s actually the best teacher. It’s the moment when we’re tested, when we discover the parts of ourselves we didn’t know existed. And that’s where the growth happens. If we never fail, if we never push ourselves to the point where we might fall, then we’re never going to really know what we’re capable of.” She smiled, her tone lightening. “Failure is just a chapter in the story, not the ending.”

Host: The soft rhythm of the rain continued as the evening stretched on, their conversation a gentle but powerful reminder that failure wasn’t something to fear—it was something to embrace. The true measure of success, it seemed, was in the resilience to keep going, to try again and again, and to discover just how much we could grow when we refused to let failure define us.

Jack: “Maybe that’s the key to everything—embracing failure as part of the journey, not as the end of it. Knowing that the road isn’t always smooth, but that’s where you find out how much you can really handle, how much you can really achieve. It’s not the success that teaches you, it’s the failures along the way.”

Jeeny: “Exactly,” she said, her voice warm with quiet satisfaction. “The more we fail, the more we learn. And the more we learn, the closer we get to truly discovering what we’re capable of.”

Host: As the rain began to lighten, the world outside seemed quieter, softer, while inside, the understanding between Jack and Jeeny grew clearer. The conversation had unfolded like a gentle reminder—failure wasn’t the enemy, it was a step forward, a part of the process, a lesson in resilience. Maybe the true measure of our potential wasn’t how often we succeeded, but how many times we were willing to get back up and try again.