J.K. Rowling

J.K. Rowling is the author of the bestselling, fantasy series book in history “Harry Potter”. Her biography and speeches are very inspirational as she narrates of the challenges she has come across in her life to where she is today. Her view about failure is very encouraging as she focuses on the makes done by failure through giving her own life as an example. Coming from a poor family never stopped her from being the today’s role model woman she has become. Her life is an example of a person that lives doing what is loved and setting her own definition of failure against the expectations of those around her. Her biography inspires me to hold on to talent and work hard on it without ever letting anything deter me from achieving it. Despite the discouragements she faced in life, like broken marriage and succumbing to poverty she never let her passion for writing go.

Failure comes to everybody and what matters most is what we learn from it. It is meant to show us a side we never knew it existed before. It shows us how strong we are and makes known to us just the much we can handle. As Rowling says, “You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity” (Rowling, 1). However, it is upon oneself as Rowling puts it, to choose the definition of failure or else the world will do it. That definition dictates its meaning to an individual. Had Rowling given up after her divorce, she would have wasted a great deal of talent. Had she listened to the definition of others who believed that she would fail if she becomes a writer, she would have never got the acknowledgements received to date. The fear of failure stops many from trying, that is the only way to success. Like she said in her speech, failure forces one to accept the reality and put more efforts to what matters most in their lives. With more efforts on what she felt was her destiny, her job of writing novels paid off well.

As Rowling notes, imagination in the form of empathizing with others, plays a vital role in our daily lives. It gives humans the humane face as they stretch beyond that affects them to what affect others as well. The realization of the good state of life that we are living in contrast to what others are living and making efforts to identify with them, is the full length of imagination. Those who are capable of learning through this imagination make the world a safer place as they learn not through their own experience. This is because they sympathize and employ all the power they can access to ensure the bad experiences never happen again. As Rowling challenges the graduates, they should go out there and be the voice of the voiceless through imagining themselves as the powerless and oppressed people. Though, we have not experienced what the oppressed experience is, we have to imagine ourselves in their circumstances, as this is not only a privilege, but also our burden. If each of us takes this responsibility, we make the world better.

Finally, I fully agree with Rowling when she acknowledges the role of friends in our lives. These are the family which is always for us when our real families are nowhere to be seen. They give us the support even when we are paying for our mistakes; they give us hope, when it seems dark enough to give up. Friends are the ones encouraging us to go on; Rowling recalls of a friend who was the first one to believe she would be a success in writing, even when her own parents thought otherwise. Usually friendship starts with having something in common, as Rowling says, like those who she graduated with, and it is worth to maintain this friendship in life. The issues addressed by the Rowling’s article: getting the best from failure, power of imagination and friendship are life essentials.

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