The Art of Failing

The Art of Failing PDF Author: Anthony McGowan
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1786071835
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
An Observer book of the year HAUNTED! By endless tiny humiliations. STRUGGLING! To resurrect the corpse of his literary career. ENSNARED! In a loving yet bamboozling marriage. A man at odds with the universe, Anthony McGowan stumbles from one improbable fiasco to the next. On the mean streets of West Hampstead he reflects upon all that is at the heart of life itself – socks with holes, underwhelming packed lunches, broken washing machines, Kierkegaard, liver salts, British Library eccentricities and disapproving ladies on trains. In this chronicle of one man’s daily failures and disappointments, McGowan can’t help but speak his mind – with cringeworthy and hilarious results.

The Art of Failing

The Art of Failing PDF Author: Anthony McGowan
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1786071835
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Get Book

Book Description
An Observer book of the year HAUNTED! By endless tiny humiliations. STRUGGLING! To resurrect the corpse of his literary career. ENSNARED! In a loving yet bamboozling marriage. A man at odds with the universe, Anthony McGowan stumbles from one improbable fiasco to the next. On the mean streets of West Hampstead he reflects upon all that is at the heart of life itself – socks with holes, underwhelming packed lunches, broken washing machines, Kierkegaard, liver salts, British Library eccentricities and disapproving ladies on trains. In this chronicle of one man’s daily failures and disappointments, McGowan can’t help but speak his mind – with cringeworthy and hilarious results.

The Art of Failure

The Art of Failure PDF Author: Jesper Juul
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262529955
Category : Games & Activities
Languages : en
Pages : 173

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Book Description
A gaming academic offers a “fascinating” exploration of why we play video games—despite the unhappiness we feel when we fail at them (Boston Globe) We may think of video games as being “fun,” but in The Art of Failure, Jesper Juul claims that this is almost entirely mistaken. When we play video games, our facial expressions are rarely those of happiness or bliss. Instead, we frown, grimace, and shout in frustration as we lose, or die, or fail to advance to the next level. Humans may have a fundamental desire to succeed and feel competent, but game players choose to engage in an activity in which they are nearly certain to fail and feel incompetent. So why do we play video games even though they make us unhappy? Juul examines this paradox. In video games, as in tragic works of art, literature, theater, and cinema, it seems that we want to experience unpleasantness even if we also dislike it. Reader or audience reaction to tragedy is often explained as catharsis, as a purging of negative emotions. But, Juul points out, this doesn't seem to be the case for video game players. Games do not purge us of unpleasant emotions; they produce them in the first place. What, then, does failure in video game playing do? Juul argues that failure in a game is unique in that when you fail in a game, you (not a character) are in some way inadequate. Yet games also motivate us to play more, in order to escape that inadequacy, and the feeling of escaping failure (often by improving skills) is a central enjoyment of games. Games, writes Juul, are the art of failure: the singular art form that sets us up for failure and allows us to experience it and experiment with it. The Art of Failure is essential reading for anyone interested in video games, whether as entertainment, art, or education.

The Queer Art of Failure

The Queer Art of Failure PDF Author: Jack Halberstam
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822350459
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 234

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Book Description
DIVProminent queer theorist offers a "low theory" of culture knowledge drawn from popular texts and films./div

The Up Side of Down

The Up Side of Down PDF Author: Megan McArdle
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0698151496
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
“Clever, surprisingly fast-paced, and enlightening.” —Forbes Most new products fail. So do most businesses. And most of us, if we are honest, have experienced a major setback in our personal or professional lives. So what determines who will bounce back and follow up with a home run? What separates those who keep treading water from those who harness the lessons from their mistakes? One of our most popular business bloggers, Megan McArdle takes insights from emergency room doctors, kindergarten teachers, bankruptcy judges, and venture capitalists to teach us how to reinvent ourselves in the face of failure. The Up Side of Down is a book that just might change the way you lead your life.

The Art of Doing

The Art of Doing PDF Author: Camille Sweeney
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0452298172
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
How does anyone get to the top of their field? We all know it takes hard work, dedication, and the occasional dose of luck, but what separates a wannabe from a winner? The Art of Doing brings together an incredible cross-section of individuals who are the at the top of their respective fields, from actor Alec Baldwin to New York Times crossword puzzle editor Will Shortz, to and asks them each one question: how do you succeed at what you do? The advice that they share is illuminating, and occasionally surprising, providing their top ten strategies on how to achieve greatness in a variety of ways. From the practical ("How to Open a Restaurant and Stay in Business," by restaurateur David Chang) to the zany ("How to Live Life on the High Wire," by infamous World Trade Center tightrope walker Philippe Petit), each interview is a testament to the knowledge and experiences that these risk-taking, barrier-breaking individuals have used to achieve their own success. With its diverse perspectives and variety of opinions about how to be the best in any field, this book will shape readers' views of success and inspire them to carve out their own niche.

Failing Desire

Failing Desire PDF Author: Karmen MacKendrick
Publisher: SUNY Press
ISBN: 1438468911
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
Draws on theology and queer theory to argue for the power of humiliating pleasures in a culture oriented very strongly to denying any enjoyment that is not about success. Luckily for human diversity, we are perfectly capable of desiring impossible things. Failing Desire explores a particular set of these impossibilities, those connected to humiliation. These include the failure of autonomy in submission, of inward privacy in confession, of visual modesty in exhibition, and of dignity in playing various roles. Historically, those who find pleasure in these failures range from ancient Cynics through early Christian monks to those now drawn by queer or perverse eroticism. As Judith Halberstam pointed out in The Queer Art of Failure, failure can actually be a mode of resistance to demands for what a culture defines as success. Karmen MacKendrick draws on this interest in queer refusals. To value, desire, or seek humiliation undercuts any striving for success, but it draws our attention particularly to the failures of knowledge as a form of power, whether that knowledge is of one body or of a population. How can we understand will that seeks not to govern itself, psychology that constructs inwardness by telling all, blushing shame that delights in exposure, or dignity that refuses its lofty position? Failing Desire suggests that the power of these desires and pleasures comes out of the very realization that this question can never quite be answered. “In Failing Desire, Karmen MacKendrick offers her readers something akin to a sequel to Counterpleasures. Pursuing the negative affects of failure, humiliation, and shame across authors that inform much of her work—Bataille, Blanchot, Augustine, Foucault, Kristeva, and Laure—MacKendrick effortlessly and breathlessly provides us with provocative new insights about the limitations of language, the pleasures of submission and obedience, and the wily unruliness of the flesh. For her devotees, the evocative prose and suggestive analysis will seem familiar, without being stale or repetitious; for novices, her style and acumen will seem assured and electrifying. MacKendrick breathes new life into authors, texts, and topics that have been at the forefront of critical engagements with embodiment, desire, and affect for the past several decades.” — Kent L. Brintnall, author of Ecce Homo: The Male-Body-in-Pain as Redemptive Figure

Failing Up

Failing Up PDF Author: Leslie Odom, Jr.
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
ISBN: 125013997X
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description
Leslie Odom Jr., burst on the scene in 2015, originating the role of Aaron Burr in the Broadway musical phenomenon Hamilton. Since then, he has performed for sold-out audiences, sung for the Obamas at the White House, and won a Tony Award for Best Leading Actor in a Musical. But before he landed the role of a lifetime in one of the biggest musicals of all time, Odom put in years of hard work as a singer and an actor. With personal stories from his life, Odom asks the questions that will help you unlock your true potential and achieve your goals even when they seem impossible. What work did you put in today that will help you improve tomorrow? How do you surround yourself with people who will care about your dreams as much as you do? How do you know when to play it safe and when to risk it all for something bigger and better? These stories will inspire you, motivate you, and empower you for the greatness that lies ahead, whether you’re graduating from college, starting a new job, or just looking to live each day to the fullest.

Failing Upwards

Failing Upwards PDF Author: Benjamin A. Chapin
Publisher: CreateSpace
ISBN: 9781499643299
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 48

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Book Description
"When I think of failure, I like to think of it as a hurdle on a race track. It is up ahead of myself (the runner) and I need to calculate when to change my direction upwards. Is my hurdle (failure) the end of the road? No, it's just an obstacle in the way I need to overcome in order to cross the finish line. That explains what this book is about in a nut shell." ~ Benjamin A. Chapin Failure is a part of every great success we have in life. Instead of having fear, we need to embrace failure firmly, look for the signs and learn every time we face it. Failure is not a burden and offers incredible value if we know how to approach it. This book was written to help people embrace that concept. At the end of this book, you will have a firm understanding of failure and how to use it to your benefit. What You Will Learn• Control the fears of failure in your mind • Discover what failure looks like and how to handle it • Learn from the failures of the past • Experience the joy of helping others through their own failures Does failure hold you back?Do you dwell on thoughts of failure in the areas you are trying to progress in? Do you attempt to avoid failure at all costs? Does it seem you just keep failing at every turn? Do you want to better your life? Do you have a desire to help others through their own failures? If you answered "Yes" to some or all of these questions, you will benefit from this book. Failure will happen in life with everything we attempt to do. At some point, you are going to fail and you have to recognize that failure when it happens so you can pivot your direction and continue upwards toward your success.

The Art of Waiting

The Art of Waiting PDF Author: Belle Boggs
Publisher: Graywolf Press
ISBN: 1555979459
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
A brilliant exploration of the natural, medical, psychological, and political facets of fertility When Belle Boggs's "The Art of Waiting" was published in Orion in 2012, it went viral, leading to republication in Harper's Magazine, an interview on NPR's The Diane Rehm Show, and a spot at the intersection of "highbrow" and "brilliant" in New York magazine's "Approval Matrix." In that heartbreaking essay, Boggs eloquently recounts her realization that she might never be able to conceive. She searches the apparently fertile world around her--the emergence of thirteen-year cicadas, the birth of eaglets near her rural home, and an unusual gorilla pregnancy at a local zoo--for signs that she is not alone. Boggs also explores other aspects of fertility and infertility: the way longing for a child plays out in the classic Coen brothers film Raising Arizona; the depiction of childlessness in literature, from Macbeth to Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?; the financial and legal complications that accompany alternative means of family making; the private and public expressions of iconic writers grappling with motherhood and fertility. She reports, with great empathy, complex stories of couples who adopted domestically and from overseas, LGBT couples considering assisted reproduction and surrogacy, and women and men reflecting on childless or child-free lives. In The Art of Waiting, Boggs deftly distills her time of waiting into an expansive contemplation of fertility, choice, and the many possible roads to making a life and making a family.

The Artist's Way

The Artist's Way PDF Author: Julia Cameron
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101156880
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
"With its gentle affirmations, inspirational quotes, fill-in-the-blank lists and tasks — write yourself a thank-you letter, describe yourself at 80, for example — The Artist’s Way proposes an egalitarian view of creativity: Everyone’s got it."—The New York Times "Morning Pages have become a household name, a shorthand for unlocking your creative potential"—Vogue Over four million copies sold! Since its first publication, The Artist's Way phenomena has inspired the genius of Elizabeth Gilbert and millions of readers to embark on a creative journey and find a deeper connection to process and purpose. Julia Cameron's novel approach guides readers in uncovering problems areas and pressure points that may be restricting their creative flow and offers techniques to free up any areas where they might be stuck, opening up opportunities for self-growth and self-discovery. The program begins with Cameron’s most vital tools for creative recovery – The Morning Pages, a daily writing ritual of three pages of stream-of-conscious, and The Artist Date, a dedicated block of time to nurture your inner artist. From there, she shares hundreds of exercises, activities, and prompts to help readers thoroughly explore each chapter. She also offers guidance on starting a “Creative Cluster” of fellow artists who will support you in your creative endeavors. A revolutionary program for personal renewal, The Artist's Way will help get you back on track, rediscover your passions, and take the steps you need to change your life.