Failure gets a bad rap. It’s a term people generally associate with negativity. It’s considered the opposite of success. But, what if failure is actually necessary for us to achieve the success we want? Ask anyone you consider ‘successful’ what part failure played in their success. Chances are that their failures were integral in them getting to where they are today. So, if we shift our perspectives, and begin to see failing as beneficial, we can turn failures into advantages that contribute to our future success. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
Avoid Negativity
Mistakes and setbacks are frustrating, but we have to avoid beating ourselves up when we don’t get it right the first time (or second, or third). Take a few moments for reflection after a failure, regroup, and then try again. When we accept our mistakes and put in the effort to learn from them, we can come away from the experience with more knowledge and increased motivation. Give yourself some credit for trying, and then refocus your efforts toward future success.
Act
Fear of failure is common, and it can keep us from taking action that would undoubtedly benefit us. We need to make decisions and then we have to act on them if we ever hope to reach what we define as success. We need to be brave enough to try in those moments when we don’t have a 100% chance of success. Changing our perception of success can help — instead of defining it as the absence of failure, try to see it as the growth that results from failure. The path to achieving our goals is almost always a circuitous one, and when we expect twists, turns, setbacks, etc., it’s both easier to get started, and easier to keep moving forward. While inaction let’s us avoid failure, it becomes a different kind of failure by keeping us from going after our goals. More on maintaining your drive, here.
Use Your Mistakes
When we allow our mistakes to deflate us, we diminish our ability to learn, adjust course, and set new goals. Mistakes are a part of human existence, and trial-and-error is an integral part of how we learn. In fact, many of our greatest life lessons often come from making mistakes. Try to take those low moments and identify the lesson in them. Then you can build on those lessons and continue to press on. If you see yourself getting mired in frustration and disappointment, try to adjust your mindset. Reflect on what you learned and then modify your plan for future attempts. This shift in perspective can instantly transform something that could have stopped our progress into a learning moment that spurs us on to greater heights.
Be Consistent
Forward motion is always positive, so it’s imperative that we keep moving forward, even when we feel discouraged by a setback. Again, it’s helpful to keep in mind that the path to achievement is rarely a straight line. And if we want to stay on that path, we have to be consistent. Keep taking daily steps toward your goals. Sure, some of those steps will lead to unexpected failures, but others will lead to major progress.
Utilize Your Support System
A portion of the credit for any success we achieve comes from our support system. Include your family, friends, colleagues, and mentors in your progress. It’s one of the best ways to hold ourselves accountable. Whatever your support system looks like, utilize it. You’ll find that it can take some of the sting out of failure, and it help motivate you to get back up and try again.
We’ve all been taught that success and failure are diametric opposites; but in reality, success is often the result of failure and the knowledge we glean from it. Shifting our perspective to see failure as a necessity on our path to success will remove much of its power to stop us from making progress in pursuit of what it is that we want to achieve.
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