Over the past few days, the idea of embracing failure has been pounded into my head like a loose nail into a 2 by 4. That was kind of graphic. I apologize, but really, it’s an important idea to drive home.
I’m taking an entrepreneurship class and the professor told us that falling short in a startup business is by no means a failure. He said as long as you learn from your experience there’s nothing to be ashamed of. Why isn’t that our approach to everything?
To fail, you have to take a risk. You risked not doing your homework, so you got an F. You risked not finishing a project, so you were fired from your job. Those are bad risks. They don’t make sense, but we take them every day.
No one likes taking big risks. It’s scary. It’s unknown. It could potentially lead to failure. And what happens when you fail? Is it the end of the world? Is that the point of no return?
Not even close. It’s just the point where you bounce back. Failure is a learning pit stop; it’s not the end of the road.
If you don’t take chances, you will not be better than average. Fight me on that one. You’ll go through life subscribing to the norm, jamming square pegs into square holes, doing as little as possible to stretch yourself and grow. You’ll settle for mediocrity when an opportunity for greatness is on the table.
Say you take a good risk (relative term). What if you tried to connect with a guy vastly different from yourself to positively influence him? If you fail, well, you are now in the same boat you started in. But if you succeed, who knows what kind of impact you might have on that person’s life?
If it doesn’t work out, you gave it your best shot but that job, or club, or activity just isn’t for you. Pick up the pieces and move on. A month from now, no one will even remember that you stumbled. Honestly, you might even forget.
We’re so accustomed to staying inside of our comfort zones. We avoid challenges like the plague. We ask ourselves “why?” instead of “why not?”
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t love to fail. “Find time to fail” is not on my to-do list. No one likes that feeling; however, it shows that you were willing to take a chance. You decided you were going to push the envelope of your abilities.
Embrace it when it happens, learn from your mistakes, and then move on (hopefully to your next risk). At the end of the day, whether you fail or succeed, your Father, friends and family still love you—and really, that’s all that matters.
Why are you just coasting through life settling for average? Why aren’t you taking risks in talking to people, in taking challenging classes, in pushing far beyond what you ever thought you were capable of? See the success in failure—all you have to do is open your eyes.