We all have things that we’re scared of. I mean, there are all sorts of little things that scare us. I hate cockroaches, personally. But stuff like that is sort of a surface-level fear that doesn’t disrupt much. There are the bigger things, though, those fears that can throw a monkey wrench into your life. For me, fear of failure is the worst.

It’s been with me since childhood, the fear of failure, of not living up to some nebulous standard or goal in my mind. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized how much that fear has been the root of a great deal of anxiety and depression. Of recent years, I’ve been trying to learn how to give myself a break, to not be so hard on myself. In my occupation as an air traffic controller, I have found that to be a delicate balance to keep. Sure, I don’t want to beat up on myself too much, but it’s also sort of important to live up to certain standards for the safety of the flying public.

But to be very honest, I’ve found that not beating my own ass in my hobbies has been far more important. Those things are supposed to be fun and uplifting and edifying. They are supposed to be positive ways of enjoying our relaxation time. Healthy pasttimes and pursuits. Turning our hobbies into another source of self hatred and loathing is, quite obviously, not healthy.

This has required some mental rewiring for myself. But before I get into that, let me share with you some of my scale modeling failures, and then hopefully that redefinition will make more sense.

This is kind of a simple one. Back before Amusing Hobby and Trumpeter, resin companies like New Connection were a prime source of your “What If” kits. This was their 30.5cm Bär, which was really quite a nice kit. But like any resin kit, it required a little finesse, and 15 years ago, I didn’t always have the patience for finesse. This kit was a prime example. I rushed thing, made mistakes, lost motivation, and then hated myself for it. Into a box in the back of the closet it went.

I’ve discussed before the cosmic curse I am under whereas the 38(t) series of vehicles is concerned, and this Dragon Marder III was no exception. It was originally going to be my entry for WME 2020, but a pin wash whose excess refused to be removed put me in a serious funk, and this one went straight into the trash.

This was a fun little project, a fictional StuH 42 Hetzer that was also an experiment with some new airbrushing techniques. Everything was going great until I applied a VMS gloss coat, which came out pebbly and rough. This was my fault for not knowing the nature of that particular beast, and was totally preventable. Maybe even fixable. Again, I proceeded to both beat myself up over my error as well as chucking this thing right across the room.

The Sturer Emil is one of my favorite subjects, and when I decided to tackle the Trumpeter kit, I decided to go all out: photo-etch, resin, turned barrel, the whole works. Part of that effort was scratch building some torsion bars, as these could be seen a little through the fighting compartment. No problem there. But the photo-etch ammo racks, that was another story. I tried and tried with multiple etch sets to get it right, but they defeated me every time. Into the trash can it went.

One of my more serious scratch building efforts from years past was this T29E3 based on HobbyBoss Pershing parts. It was going reasonably well, until it came to the tracks. Quite frankly, I just gave up in the face of not only the work, but all the new things I’d have to learn and master just to get to the work.

This one still stings a bit. I love the Churchill tank, and had some specific goals for this. Primarily, I wanted to do a heavily weathered winter whitewash. Lots of mud. You know, all sorts of character and interest. I Decided I would jump right into the hair spray technique for the whitewash, which I had never tried before. And, of course, did not go well. This was another project that was followed by a few months of sullen absence from the work bench.

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Looking back and reflecting on all of these projects gone sideways, I realized a few things. For one, I enjoyed them all immensely right up to the point of failure or defeat. Also, I learned a great deal for having spent time on each of these projects. The time spent at the bench was productive, despite each of these projects not reaching completion.

Most interestingly, when I reflect back on them now, I find that I remember each of these projects fondly. I had fun with them. 99% of the time spent with them was enjoyable. I no longer feel that dark sense of worthlessness that I did when I realized that things were not going to turn out like I had planned.

So, if you’re keeping score:

1. I had fun working on these models;
2. I learned a lot;
3. They were not permanent black marks on my psyche.

So, really, in retrospect, were they even failures? Looking back now, no, they weren’t, because I accomplished what I always set out to do when I build a model. I had fun, I learned new things, and I moved on with life.

Moral to the story: don’t sweat the models you don’t finish. Whether you lose interest or you screw it up, it’s no big deal. There are always more models. And if you’re like me, you have a stash of kits you can fall back on and immediately start the next adventure. It really is about the journey, not the end result. If you build a thousand kits and never paint a single one, if they’re covered of gluey fingerprints, it’s a success if you enjoyed the time you spent doing it. What you end up putting on the shelf or in the display case should not be the goal, but rather, those models you put on display and look at from time to time should be reminders of time well spent in an enjoyable pursuit.

Damn the results, enjoy the hobby!