History Main / YouWereTryingTooHard

* ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts3DDreamDropDistance'' has Lea train to become a Keyblade wielder but couldn't get his weapon to materialize during his first battle and has to use his old weapons. Later, he comments about this failure while randomly gesturing his wrist, upon which his Keyblade finally materialize, surprising everyone in the room.

* ''Series/{{Eureka}}'', "Your face or mine?": Carter is isolated in a test room and tries to get out. He only finds a way when he's ready to give up.

* Spenny's number one problem when trying to win competitions in ''Series/KennyVsSpenny''.

** In "Booby Trap," the Enterprise is caught in an energy-sucking asteroid field which, true to its description, sucks any and all power out of the engines. The crew spends the episode trying to figure out how to put more energy into the engines until they figure out that "That's the trap!" They escape by shutting the engines down and using a single thruster to fly free.

** In "Q Who," Q tells Picard he wants to become a member of the Enterprise, and he'll even renounce his godly powers to do so. Picard tells them he believes they are equipped to handle anything the universe can throw them without Q's help. So, Q throws the Enterprise into Borg space. Just as the Borg are about to destroy/assimilate the Enterprise, Picard admits they aren't prepared and they do need Q after all. Satisfied, Q whisks them away from Borg space and departs. (Note that it wasn't simply because Picard satisfied Q's ego, but because Picard showed he was not too prideful to either realize or admit he was wrong.)

** In "Lower Decks," Ensign Sito gets chewed out by Picard regarding things she did while at Starfleet Academy. She accepts the dressing down quietly. Later, while taking martial arts lessons from Worf, he tells her to put on a blindfold and defend herself. After being smacked around by Worf several times, she gives up and tears off the blindfold, shouting at Worf that it wasn't a fair test. Worf is pleased with her response, and tells her that he hopes the next time she's being treated unfairly, she'll speak up. She goes back to Picard and tells him that she should be judged by her actions on the Enterprise, not on what she did in the Academy. If he felt that strongly that her past couldn't be overlooked, he should never have accepted her posting on his ship to begin with. It turns out that Picard, having specifically ''requested'' her for the Enterprise to be sure she got a fair chance despite her past, had been giving her a SecretTestOfCharacter hoping she would react assertively.

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': In [[Recap/StevenUniverseS1E37AloneTogether "Alone Together"]], when Steven tries to fuse with Gems, he finds it hard to keep with their very complicated and distinct dancing styles. Later, when he's dancing with Connie, he's much more relaxed in mind and free-flowing in style, which eventually leads them to becoming Stevonnie.

* ''ComicStrip/{{Jon}}'': Garfield says the ugly kitten whose failed attempts to get attention consisted on acting cute was trying too hard.

* Shirogane from ''Manga/KaguyaSamaLoveIsWar'' is always had the most success in getting Kaguya to fall for him when he's more focused on something else, best seen during the stargazing chapter where he performs romantic acts without a second thought that he'd normally be far too embarrassed to do.

* In one ''Franchise/SpiderMan'' story that takes place after Spidey loses the Captain Universe powers, Spidey is abducted by the size-manipulation villain Psycho-Man and brought to his fortress in the Micro-Verse. Spidey is dumbfounded when he discovers a shrunken universe held captive! The egotistical villain gloats, relating how he reduced this whole universe in size and now holds it captive, and says he demanded the inhabitants surrender and accept him as ruler, else he crush them; they agreed, but when he tried to restore it to normal (it was pointless to rule a shrunken universe), he found his technology was lacking the required power. Knowing that it took far more energy to make things larger than it did to make them smaller, he had to obtain the near-limitless energy of the Uni-Power to do so in order to rule them. Spidey then asked a question: "If you couldn't make them larger, why didn't you ''make yourself smaller''?" The villain was speechless for a minute. He had simply never thought of that!

** In one Sherman and Peabody segment, where the pair meet Dr. David Livingstone, the protagonists befriend a tribe of natives, who ask them to solve a problem: the chieftain's father has been in the center of a lake for a week, and won't come out, and nobody knows why. After both Livingstone and Stanley try complex ideas and fail, Peabody tries something simple: he throws the old man a towel, which does work, getting him to come out. Peabody explains that he had simply gone swimming and had lost his trunks, and was waiting for someone to throw him a towel.

* Shirogane from ''Manga/KaguyaSamaLoveIsWar'' is always had the most success in getting Kaguya to fall for him when he's more focused on something else, best seen during the stargazing chapter where he performs romantic acts without a second thought that he'd normally be far to embarrassed to do.

* During the Valentine's Day arc in ''Manga/AssassinationClassroom'', [[spoiler:Akari]] angsts over how to [[LoveConfession confess]] to Nagisa. She researches how other girls do it, she asks Karma for advice...but in the end, realizes that all she really needed (or wanted) to do was express her feelings honestly to him. This trope also applies to another aspect of their relationship: [[spoiler:while Akari was playing the part of a carefree schoolgirl, she interacted with Nagisa calmly and easily (even though their friendship was important to both Kayano (Akari's false persona) and her "true self"). It's only once she starts taking it seriously that she doesn't know how to deal with it.]]

* This is the entire philosophy of Buddhism. To achieve enlightenment, you must cast aside all desire for food, water, emotions, everything. And that includes the desire for enlightenment. That's right, to achieve enlightenment, [[LogicBomb you must not want enlightenment]]. It's part of transcending human weakness to achieve oneness with the cosmos.

* The Medieval Fair that WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}} and his class goes to has a replica of {{Excaliburn}} stuck in a rock, which attendees are challenged to try pulling out for a prize. Nobody can do it until Arthur, hearing the barker say "All your might won't set things right! 'Tis a steady hand will rule the land!", tries gently jiggling the sword out. It works, and even [[SadistTeacher Mr. Ratburn's former teacher Mr. Price-Jones]] is impressed.

* In ''Fanfic/{{Luminosity}}'', Elspeth keeps trying to convince [[TalkingToHerself herself]] that she should be able to use her "I am being honest" magic when she's lying, or be able to turn it off, and failing. Finally, she is simply herself, who hates lying, and happens to be unsure. (Emphasis added)

->''"There's a Zen {{koan}}. It says that if you want to find something, you have to stop looking."''

* Played for laughs in the ''Literature/AcornaSeries'' : When the Linyaari make first contact with humanity, one of the first humans they encounter is PhonyPsychic Karina, who is ecstatic to encounter an entire races of psychics "like her." It turns out she actually did have some measure of telepathic ability, but every time she tried to "use her gifts" (using her own "visualization techniques") to make contact, it actually interfered with the Linyaari's own attempts.

* In ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'', Ichigo learns the Final Getsuga Tensho by realizing he has to give up and [[spoiler:let Tensa Zangetsu impale him with his sword]].