Understanding the role that failure plays in success.
It is impossible to be successful in everything that we do, but the word “fail” is a tough one for most of us to swallow, especially when we live in such a success driven world. If we don’t succeed every single time we tend to beat ourselves up, but do we realise and appreciate the importance of “failure” in the overall success process?
To help put the concept of failure into perspective –
Beethoven – his musical teacher described him as “hopeless”.
Thomas Edison – his teachers said –“he was too stupid to learn anything” and he was fired from his first two jobs because he couldn’t apply himself.
Henry Ford – failed and went broke 5 times before he succeeded.
Walt Disney – fired by a newspaper because “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas”
Michael Jordon – was cut from his high school basketball team – he famously stated – “I’ve failed over and over again in my life, that is why I succeed”.
Failure is a big part of any success story I have ever read. I have no doubt that the failures identified above helped to spur these people on to achieve incredible things. In my own world, with my books, presentations and training, most of what I have learnt has come from mistakes that I have made or witnessed in other businesses and that is the information that I share. We learn so much from the things that impact us and affect us directly.
For any life to have substance there have to be both the ups and downs – we both experience both to appreciate them fully. Now I know we don’t like the downs, but they are what make the up’s so much sweeter.
The moral to the story is don’t beat yourself up if make mistakes, get things wrongs or perhaps don’t succeed at the level you wanted right now. Understand that this is part of the process of life. Every failure is a step closer to success. It might sound like a corny cliche, but I believe that this is very positive way to look at life.
HOW TO GROW FROM OUR MISTAKES AND FAILURES
When faced with failure I suggest pondering the following to put it into perspective –
Ask yourself what have you learnt from this failure?
What would you differently next time?
What is the upside of this failure? (There is always an upside and this drives us forward, teaches us humility and so much more).
Give yourself credit for getting back up.
Understand that sometimes not succeeding is the best outcome – because something even better could be just around the corner.
Until next time, embrace those failures!
Cheers,
Andrew
PROFESSIONAL PRESENTERS BOOTCAMP – There are a few spaces left for the next Cairns based workshop – Thursday 3rd February. For more information or to book your space – CLICK HERE.
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