Super Bowl Loss Yields Life Lessons

As everyone knows by now, our Pittsburgh Steelers were unsuccessful in their attempt to win an NFL-record seventh world championship this past weekend by falling to the Green Bay Packers in Super Bowl LXV.

The result was a subdued Steeler Nation stumbling through the inevitable, yet temporary, search for answers and explanations that might justify the loss. When a town puts such a strong emotional investment into their team and falls just short of the ultimate prize, the disappointment in the air is palpable.

Sure, it would have been great to beat Green Bay and bring home another Super Bowl trophy, but anyone who watched the game will admit -- even if perhaps grudgingly through black-and-gold tinted glasses -- that the Steelers were outplayed by the Packers.

Throwing out everything leading up to the Super Bowl itself, the Steelers simply did not deserve to win the game based on their play, and the Packers did.

Sometimes even the best of the best fail to live up to our expectations. Everyone has days where they are off their game. Even Christina Aguilera, who has won four Grammy awards for her singing abilities, screwed up the lyrics to the national anthem in front of one of the largest television audiences of all time.

Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger’s post-game comments said it all.

"I don't blame anyone but myself. There were a lot of throws I'd like to have back. I turned the ball over. You can't do that. I feel like I let down the city of Pittsburgh, the fans, my coaches, my teammates  -- it's not a good feeling."

He’s right - it wasn’t a good feeling for anyone, but perhaps some good can come as a result.

In a world where professional athletes and celebrities are held up as role models, deserving or not, there is an important lesson to be learned here: It is better to try and fail then not to try at all.

No matter how many times you throw a pass or sing a song, sometimes things go wrong, but it doesn’t mean you stop trying; it should instead serve as the motivating factor to do better the next time.

I can speak from personal experience on this one, having lost the first time I ran for office back in 2004. The experience of losing made me a better candidate and ultimately a much better state representative.

I learned from my early mistakes and resolved to do my best to avoid repeating them in the future. Instead of branding someone as a loser because they didn’t succeed at a particular point, it does a world of good to consider them a winner in training.

I take solace in the words of author Richard Bach, who said, “That's what learning is, after all; not whether we lose the game, but how we lose and how we've changed because of it and what we take away from it that we never had before, to apply to other games. Losing, in a curious way, is winning.”

Sure, it doesn’t take away the sting of Sunday’s loss, but it provides hope for the future with a valuable lesson learned along the way. Even the best come up short sometimes, and we should all encourage those around us to do better rather than kick them when they’re down.