Why Experiencing Failure is Not the End, It's The Beginning
You may not have finished your high school diploma this year, or got the job you wanted. You may not have been chosen for the team or received the award. Maybe, a business you were building didn’t work out. Whatever is making you feel like a failure, doesn’t define what you are or what you are capable of accomplishing. As a matter of fact, failures are the start of something better.
Can you believe that in his early years, Walt Disney was fired from a newspaper job for lacking creativity? Bill Gates and Paul Allen’s first company, a data analytics technology, bombed. In 1999, Paypal, a startup company from Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, was voted “the Worst Business Concept of the Year”. These individuals all went on to have huge success after many, many failures. At some point, they were likely told to give up. We all fail, but the most successful people are simply the ones who didn’t give up.
Creative life hackery
Sometimes, we can feel like we’re at a “dead end” and there’s nowhere else to go. You might feel like you’re pinned against a wall, held down by a tentacle, while Vecna tries to take you out (Sorry, I couldn’t resist a Stranger Things 4 reference)! In these moments, you’ll find yourself either overcome with fear OR you’ll find a creative way out. Which will be you?
Picture Credit: YouTube - 5-Minute Crafts
There are videos on YouTube that show “amazing life hacks that will change your life”. Okay yeah, clickbait BUT upon review, some of those videos have some interesting solutions to real nuisances — like how to cook an egg when all the dishes are dirty! We are creative beings, capable of amazing things.
Just like with the YouTube “life hack” creators, when we stop for a minute, we can brainstorm creative solutions for all kinds of problems in life. This is real life hacking!
The unique knowledge that experience brings
You may have heard it said, “Grow through what you go through.” If you haven’t heard it before, now you have! It might be annoying to tell that to someone who’s going through hard times, but there’s wisdom in it.
Failures teach us things that can only be learned by doing. When we fail we learn what works, what doesn’t, and can use that information to make it better, adjust and improve.
“A savage mindset is a conditioned mindset that knows quitting is not part of the plan. It knows that it has to find a way around any and all obstacles to complete the mission. ”
Nowhere to go but up
Trying something new is always a risk. Most of the time, when we try something new, we don’t succeed on the first attempt. All we can do is learn from the attempt and try again!
David Goggins, a retired United States Navy SEAL and former United States Air Force Tactical Air Control Party member says, “A savage mindset is a conditioned mindset that knows quitting is not part of the plan. It knows that it has to find a way around any and all obstacles to complete the mission.”
The reality is despite our setbacks and failures, the world keeps on spinning. More often than not, that feeling of loss is the beginning of something new! Remember, if you feel that you’ve failed hard and hit rock bottom, there’s nowhere to go but up!
Sources
6 Stories of Super Successes Who Overcame Failure
7 Important Lessons You Can Learn From Failure