“Failure is only the opportunity to begin again, only this time more wisely”. Henry Ford said that quote. He was one of many famous failures throughout history that didn’t see failure as the end but as an opportunity to begin again. To create the engine for the very first automobile it took many setbacks for him and the people he had hired. He told them to keep at it till they got it right because he knew that eventually with each attempt that wisdom was going to open the right door that would change history for years to come… and he did. My name is Julio Carrasco and I’m not a famous failure yet but I am working on my path to that. What I am going to share with you may shock you but it has taken me 12 years to get my Associates Degree. If you count the part time status and the in between break in between it totals to 12 years altogether for what would normally take a person about 2 years or so to get it. You can say I failed many times to achieve it sooner but I had to endure through my own personal procrastination with achieving and completing something for a change. I had to grow personally both inner and outer and while many would have done it quicker like the hare from the Aesop Fables I wanted to take it slower like the Tortoise because I knew that eventually slow and steady always wins the race if you do it wisely.
I started at Wilbur Wright College in 2004 and my Major was Computer Information Systems which I was going for my IT Associates Degree. From 2004 to 2010 I slowly racked up credits, electives, participated in internships, and was also a Treasurer and Senator of Student Government Association. I built friendships there not only with the teachers and faculty but with the students I would see each and every semester I was there. Some classes I passed, some classes I failed, some classes I dropped, and some classes I had to change. I see my college change throughout those years I was there. For those entering there now they don’t realize that their used to be a bookstore there that you could not only get your books for class but also get apparel to support your school even though was a community college at least with the apparel it made you feel a unique sense of pride to wear because it showed you were making a name for yourself and were proud to represent it. Those days are no more of course due to cuts and funding and technology. You can order your books online and other stuff but to me that route just doesn’t feel the same. I prefer an actual book versus an online e-book. That’s just how I am.
Technology advancing is great but if we get too much it in my opinion desensitizes us and eventually we’ll end up getting rid of it. I am a millennial but I say I am the “Daddy Daycare” of the millennials after me. Watching over them and along with the Generation Z’ers as well. When I came back as a student at Wright during my time in between after 2010 I want to say maybe a year or 2 ago so around 2014 or 2015 I returned back to Wright as a student I felt that to eventually get this done I had to take a different route and change my major to just a General Education Association Degree. Some may say I just quit one route and chose another. I could agree with you on some levels but I also can disagree and say I moved my chess piece on a different move and changed the route in my life that would eventually get me checkmate because life is like chess. Each move you make can take you on many different paths and it’s up to you to decide which path is going to get you to win the game and say checkmate. Fall of 2016 I Julio Carrasco graduated Wilbur Wright College and in 2017 I plan on walking that stage because no matter what anybody says for me this is my own personal famous failure of Success to finally say I graduated and got my Associates Degree because even though it to me 12 years to get it, failure is only the opportunity to begin again, only this time more wisely… which I did. Thank you and Julio out (Mic Drop)!
