I watched my mom stuff my twin sister’s mouth with a bar of soap when she heard her cussing on the front porch.  Bianca had the mouth of a sailor, a five-year-old who could make Captain Jack Sparrow blush.

My mom was convinced she could just wash away those words from her mouth, but Bianca soon took to simply saying things like, “oh shite,” or insisting she was “freaking upset.”

Together my sister and I found a cussing loophole.  NO BARS OF SOAP FOR US, MOM!

But help-us-Lord we could never, ever say the f-word.  My mom?  She didn’t believe in sparing the rod, if you know what I mean.

However, now that I have a daughter, I want to say the f-word every day.  I want to say it so often it loses its power, its fear.

FAILURE.

Didn’t think I was going there, did you?

I dream of sitting around the dinner table and asking Luna Sol how she failed that day.  And when she tells me it didn’t work/they laughed/it broke/it was a mistake, I’ll high-five her.

I want to look her in the eyes and tell her if she doesn’t fail once a day, she didn’t push her limits.  I hope she gets excited to fail.

If she normalizes failure, she’ll be unstoppable.  She won’t allow judgment or fear of the unknown dictate how big she can live her life.  She’ll refuse to take failure personally, or–worse–aim for perfection.

When she understands that failure is the only way to success, she’ll learn how to be excited to fail forward.

I can’t wait for us to love the f-word so much it drips from our lips, and when people hear us talking they’ll think we’re strange, using a taboo word with such power.  It’ll make us invincible.

I hope you join our invincible pack of two, dropping f-bombs and celebrating our success along the way.

Bar of soap not included.

To cussing loopholes,

j*