SPEAKING.APP

I was spellbound as I watched the sheriff, who had just been shot, slide back open that heavy metal door, stagger forward a couple of steps, look deep into the camera, and say, “I before E, except after C.” Contest chair, fellow Toastmasters, I was in the sixth grade in Mrs. Montgomery’s class, watching an educational video on a film projector because we were technology-challenged at my school. In the video, a sheriff was teaching us how to write while a bad guy named Bad English was shooting at him. As I watched, something started looking strange. The film slowed down. Then it jumped forward. The projector made a loud, unhappy sound, and the picture started blinking. Suddenly the sheriff was talking to us from the side of the screen. The blinking got worse. Ooh! Everything went blank. I ran to the front and turned off the projector. I opened it up, and something smelled like it was burning. “Mrs. Montgomery,” I said, “can I try to fix this?” “After school,” she said. An hour after the final bell rang, I had the entire projector disassembled all over the floor. I was starting to put it back together when the librarian, Mrs. Landon, came strolling through. “What are you doing?” she almost screamed. “Who told you you could do this?” “I did,” said Mrs. Montgomery. But the librarian zeroed in on me. “This is school property, and it better work when you put it back together. If it doesn’t, your parents are going to have to pay for it.” Now, my parents did not have a lot of money. And if I went home and told them they had to replace a projector, I would’ve been better off in the hands of Bad English. So I focused. I started rebuilding that projector piece by piece, trying to remember where every screw and spring belonged. Two hours later, it was whole. Mrs. Montgomery said, “Let’s try it.” I reached up, flipped the switch, and there, projected onto the screen in all of its glory, was… Nothing. Nothing! The projector was dead. Mrs. Montgomery put her arm around me and said, “It’s okay that you took the risk to try to fix it. The victory is not in the result. The victory is in the try.” But I still had to face the librarian… and I still thought I had to face my parents. I went home terrified. I even considered hiding in my closet until everyone forgot I existed. Then I heard from the kitchen: “Mike, come in!” I walked in and blurted out, “Mom, Dad, there’s something I have to tell you. I love you… and I am scared of sheriffs!” I panicked, ran to my room, and stared at the ceiling thinking, How do I get to Norway? I don’t know why Norway was my only safe haven at that moment. Maybe I imagined Norway had an agreement with the United Nations that they wouldn’t allow crazy librarians into the country. But that night, I drifted off to a restless sleep, dreaming of swimming to Norway. The next morning, I walked into school sick to my stomach and headed straight for the library. There sat Mrs. Landon, reading her newspaper, sipping coffee out of a mug that did not make her look more forgiving. I approached her and told her the final fate of her projector. She slowly looked up at me. Her lips curled. She leaned forward and said… “Fine.” Fine? What just happened? I was still alive. And that’s when it hit me: my failure had not killed me, and yours will not kill you. What was it that Mrs. Montgomery said? “The victory is not in the result. The victory is in the try.” Ever since then, I’ve walked through life with a little Librarian Landon on one shoulder and a Mrs. Montgomery on the other. When I tried and gave my very first speech, and it was a train wreck, my inner librarian said, “You should never try that again.” But Mrs. Montgomery reminded me that failure teaches lessons that can become a springboard to future success. And her words matter even more for you, because Toastmasters is a place where leaders are made. You are here to increase your leadership skill. And this world desperately needs leaders who create fertile soil for innovation to grow. We’ve seen what that looks like. When COVID hit, Toastmasters could’ve said, “We’ll cancel the contest, cancel the convention, and try again next year.” Instead, they chose to try something new: this virtual experience. Have there been glitches? Yes. But that’s what innovation is like. Glitches happen. And the lessons we learn by trying take us miles beyond the organizations that never took the risk. If you want to lead people to fix persistent problems, someday, somewhere, somebody is going to have to try something new. And you, as the leader, get to be Mrs. Montgomery. You get to encourage the effort, even when it might fail, because that effort is how we find the future. The victory is in the try. Be a Montgomery leader. Encourage risk. Try new things. The victory is not in the result, my friends. The victory is in the try!