My yoga story told a short story that she applied to life, but my mind immediately applied to nonprofit organizations.
Chapter 1: You’re walking down a street, and you fall in a hole. It’s dark. It takes a long time to get out.
Chapter 2:You’re walking down the street again, you pretend the hole isn’t there. You fall in. It’s dark. It takes awhile to get out.
Chapter 3: You’re walking down the street again, you see the hole, but you still fall in. It’s dark. You get out quickly.
Chapter 4: You’re walking down the street, you see the hole, and carefully go around it.
Chapter 5: You figure out where you want to go and get there by going down a different street.
My yoga instructor’s point was that eventually you want to get to chapter 5 so that you avoid entirely the situation that puts you in peril of falling in the hole.
My application of this story to nonprofits:
Chapter 1: You hold a fundraising event and it’s a bust.
Chapter 2: You hold a fundraising event and give yourself a pep talk that this time it won’t be a bust, but it is.
Chapter 3: You hold a fundraising event, recognize why the last one failed, but it still does.
Chapter 4: You hold a fundraising event, recognize why the last one failed, and manage to make it a success.
Chapter 5: You take the time/energy you put into a mediocre fundraising event and meet with individual donors, raising far more money.
Okay — just one example, and perhaps not a great one.
But the central lesson I think is sound: sometimes when we find ourselves failing at something, the answer isn’t to ignore it, or work really hard to avoid the pitfalls involved. Maybe the answer is to go do something else entirely that better achieves your goals with fewer risks.