Failure – discouraging, heartbreaking, unwanted, displeasing, the end – there are thousands of different feelings determining our reaction towards failure, most of them being on the negative side.
So, what if I ask you to fail with me? Try something and fail with me right now. How would you react?
Well, of course, having failure as a goal doesn’t seem quite desirable in most cases, and it isn’t. Nonetheless, it will be the outcome of many of your tries in life. Inevitably, you’ll be confronted with failing if you decide to put effort into achieving something huge.
A very motivating quote, at least to me personally, is one from Thomas Edison:
I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.
I think that’s a very inspiring and positive way of thinking. When something doesn’t work out as planned, many fall into thinking they’ll never achieve their goal. This quote addresses that as it implies that you just have to try enough different ways to succeed.
But, more importantly, Edison’s quote allows a very positive outlook on the efforts you’ve invested:
Time plays a crucial role in our lives. When experiencing failure, especially over and over, naturally one starts to weigh the energy and time they’ve invested with what they’ve produced till that point. This can lead to a feeling of having wasted time – losing motivation and feeling discouraged. But with Edison’s quote, saying he simply found ways that won’t work, he acknowledges every one of his attempts as a part of the progress to success.
I think of this outlook as refreshing and easygoing, something you wouldn’t necessarily expect in relation to hard work and failure. That’s why I truly like this quote; its positivity is really encouraging, don’t you think?
To me personally, failing always feels like a test.
I most often failed in periods of my life where I was doing good, where I was feeling as though I’m moving forward. And for a long time, it discouraged me to keep going.
I’m usually not the person to shy away from an opportunity to learn, but being confronted with failure over and over again, when originally feeling like you could achieve anything, makes you question your ability to assess yourself eventually.
Can I really do that? Was my feeling wrong? Maybe I got ahead of myself?
Well, spoiler: no, you didn’t. I thought fate was testing me; I thought I had to prove my belief in myself. And honestly, I don’t think that’s completely wrong. You should prove you believe in yourself beyond failing 10,000 times, however, not to any spirit or fate but to yourself.
Of course, I failed more when I was feeling confident in myself. Being confident made me try out more things. Before, I was mostly alone, in my room, scared to go out into the world, scared to be judged or to fail. Believing I could do anything, well, that led me to actually try everything.
I just recently failed again, like, a lot. I was close to giving up. But then I remembered the feeling of being tested I often had, and how often I failed to keep going. I realised that stopping, not trying at least one more time, putting an end to my efforts, was what actually made me feel like I failed in the end.
That’s why I kept going, and today I actually accomplished a small success.
This won’t be possible for every situation in life, but what helped me in this recent situation was to shift my mindset. I started to reset my goal. Well, what is that supposed to mean? Let me explain with a little example:
Let’s say you want to reach a certain number of followers on one of your socials, let’s say 10k. You keep posting, you follow trends and try to analyse your content. Nonetheless, your posts don’t seem to get enough attention.
Instead of focusing on a specific number, try focusing on your content and its impact.
Why should 10k people want to look for your content regularly? What impact has your content on their lives and yours? Maybe instead of posting for them, start creating content you enjoy, content you like, or content that gets you out of your comfort zone. Create a place you’re proud of and value everyone who acknowledges your work.
Some might say this way of thinking does not include the original goal. That might be true to a certain degree, but it allows you to create something valuable. It allows you stay motivated as it includes your interests and revolves around what you’re doing naturally. Forced content is hardly inspiring enough to attract that many people.
I’m not an analyst for social media, neither a psychologist nor any kind of expert, but I like to think that starting something for yourself is a greater source of motivation, which is essential to success in the long run. This tactic is what helps me personally as it in some way eliminates the thought of failure. Pursuing my interests, investing in myself, my development – how is that supposed to be considered failing in any kind of way?
Nonetheless, not everything in our life can be handled by only looking out for ourselves, only doing what we like and focusing on purely our own goals. When setting goals in work, school, or even trying to invent something just as Edison, thinking of it as something you do just for yourself becomes rather difficult.
There is another, probably the most popular, way of thinking that’s going to get you through failure. A way I obviously can’t leave out today: perceiving failure as a learning opportunity.
We’ve even talked about that on our blog before, but essentially, this is the most effective way to deal with failure in situations which pressure for success-driven thinking. Today I want to give you yet another example in the form of a little story:
When I first started going to university, I had no idea how to study. In fact, I wasn’t the only one without a clue; this happened to be a problem we shared as a collective. But, regardless of our abilities, exam season came up.
Before, many relied on the beloved studying-the-night-before-and-trying-to-get-everything-into-your-short-term-memory way, but with the amount we had to learn, it was clear that this wouldn’t really work anymore.
I tried to learn with flashcards. I had an app I even paid for, I created flashcards for every topic, … and ended up with over 2,000 cards to learn. I did learn them. I did learn them all. It was horrible, let me tell you that.
You may ask yourself: Did it work? Did you write a good grade? Did your hard work pay off?
No. I wrote my worst grade in that course.
I was ‘down’, I was ‘sad’ – these are understatements. I was devastated for easily a month as I worked so hard. But as a new semester was approaching, I had to get back up again.
So, what did I do? I analysed. I analysed and came up with new ways considering what went wrong and offering new approaches. I tried out different things and used my failed first attempt to make the best out of my second one.
And guess what – it worked. My second one wasn’t completely perfect, but it was close. I learned a lot about myself and my way of taking in and keeping information. This is knowledge which is very useful for me to this day.
As you can see, failing to achieve the grade I wanted wasn’t a pleasant experience, but it led to me gaining more insight about myself. It helped me to understand some of my characteristics which are useful in more areas than just when studying.
Try to make the best out of every situation. Establishing a mindset like that is truly powerful in achieving anything in life. In the end, getting worked up over failing won’t change anything. Think about it, think again, and try to tell me I’m wrong.
You think failing over and over is a waste of time. No, it’s an opportunity to learn. Missing that opportunity because of letting negative feelings get the upper hand, that’s the actual waste of time.
Don’t let a failed attempt, an unexpected event, discourage you. Don’t give up. Don’t stop.