Failure is Success in Disguise

Here is something that I have often been challenged with. That is, the idea that failing is part of success. My perfectionist brain wants to tell me that if I am to be a success in this world I must be a success all the time. It also tells me that failure is somehow a setback of some kind. It also tells me that I have a limited number of times that I can fail before I will give up on myself. And, maybe the worst thing of all is that my brain will tell me that I should not have tried in the first place if I was to fail in the end.

I am not alone in this thinking. I am absolutely not alone. There are so many people just like me that think that we need to do things right the first time. There are so many that think that we need to create a plan for success that will indeed have no failures at all in that process.

What I can tell you is that this thinking is faulty. It's just not correct. First of all, nobody else is expecting perfection from you or me. Anybody who has been around on the planet for at least a couple minutes knows that failure is a part of life. Even the baby who tries to take their first steps knows about failure. The first couple of tries usually don't work out so well. Any athlete will tell you that the first time they tried to do their sport it also didn't go so well. And, musicians will be able to describe how incredibly frustrating it was in the beginning. Now of course, some will move quickly up the ladder of success with these activities, but the truth doesn't change. It all begin with having to deal with failure.

In our world medals are not given to those that fail. Those that fail are not given standing ovations. And, they are not usually lauded and praised by others for failing once again. It just doesn't happen. Failure can even become an adjective, an actual description of a person rather than a behavior.

Here is a slogan I would love to see put in the entrance of every school: "Your beautiful house of success will be built upon a foundation of many failures".

My God, I wish I would have learned this simple truth years ago. This article is coming from the heart of someone who has falsely believed that failing is something I needed to avoid. It has prevented me from taking on so many inventive projects. It has stopped me from being the best version that I could possibly be.

Having said that, I do believe that I am much more of a risk taker than ever. I do more things today with absolutely no guarantee of an outcome that I would want. I often times have no idea whether a particular project will fail or succeed, and yet I take it on anyways.

My hope for you is that you will begin to learn how to take risks without having any idea whether the project will succeed or not. It is possible that the project will fail. But, I do believe that it is worse to hold on that belief that one should not try. Can you imagine if the little baby gave up on walking after not doing it right the first time? Imagine the lifetime of adventures that baby would have given up all because they believed they should have walked after the first try...