I stood in the produce section at the grocery store in front of a large cardboard box filled with watermelons. I couldn’t bring myself to pick one. Every single watermelon I had picked this summer had been mediocre at best. Finally I gave in, picked one, and brought it home. I didn’t feel moved to cut into it as I was dreading another disappointment. For nearly three days that watermelon sat in the same spot. At that point, I told myself it was now or never. When I cut into it, I saw the deepest shade of pink I had seen all year. This watermelon was everything I had been searching for.

I began to think about how I almost missed this. I was so close to giving in and going to buy some cut up watermelon chunks. Then, when I got home, I let this perfect watermelon sit for days. If I had continued to put it off, it would have rotted before I ever got the chance to enjoy it.

Sadly, a lot of people have gifts that they will never use, goals they’ll never accomplish, dreams that will never come true. They will never cut into their purpose, but instead let their gifts rot away because they are afraid of rejection, failure, or even just a big mess left to clean up. I’ve learned something though; the sting of failure hurts way less than the pain of rotting away and wasting what God created you for.

For years I never bought whole watermelons. It was too risky, too messy, and too much work. I was always willing to just pay a little extra to have it all done for me. With the steady rise of grocery prices, I finally said no more. It was time to put in the work, develop the skill of picking the right ones, become efficient at preparing them to eat, and deal with a few disappointments until I learned what to look for. And it may be messy (until I got the hang of cutting them) but only for a season.

I learned something else this summer—the right watermelon tastes even sweeter after failure. There’s something magical about cutting into the perfect watermelon after a season of cutting into the wrong ones.

What are you avoiding cutting into this season?