Well crap. I thought I had the will to do, to achieve, to succeed and I failed. Ugh. I suck. I’m horrible. Life is my enemy. Blah, blah, blah.
Here’s the deal: it’s good to fail. It is in failure that we learn the most (if you are willing). Nothing comes easy. You always have to fail before you can succeed. The important thing is that you get comfortable with failure. Embrace it. Ask yourself, “okay that sucked, but what can I learn from it? what can I do better or differently next time?”
Get comfortable talking about failure. “Yeah, that sucked. But here is what I learned and here is what I am going to try differently next time.”
Failure is the door through which you must walk to eventually find the ballroom of success. (yeah, I just made that up) But, it’s stinking true.
I had a public speaking engagement several months ago at which I completely flopped.
My words were way too long and off base for the setting and the audience. It was a little embarrassing, but I embraced it. People were hesitant to even talk to me about it after, but I was ready to discuss it with anyone. “Yeah, I failed,” I would say, “but I’m okay with failure. That’s how we learn and grow. I didn’t analyze the audience properly. I didn’t follow my instincts. I won’t make the same mistakes again.”
Embracing and admitting mistakes is an important practice, too, because of how people react when you show them that you are cool with being less than perfect. It signals to others that they can be less than perfect, too. It’s a way of removing judgment.
“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.” – Robert Kennedy
So, failure? Who cares. Get out of your comfort zone, try something new, care not what others may think. Read Daring Greatly by Brene’ Brown. No seriously, read that book. Don’t argue with me; it’s a short book. In it, she asks, “What would you do if you knew you could not fail?”
“Whatever you answer…Do it.”
Love and Let 