Sometimes it's ok to be a failure
(And sometimes our fear of failure holds us back, and that is the biggest failure of all)
Lake Derwent Water, The Lake District, Cumbria, UK
The ramble today is about failure. 2021 has felt like a big massive failure.
Not in a Elizabeth Day podcast guest kind of way, where they talk about failure but only now through the lens of big glittering success. But in a no-i-really-have-failed kind of way. In way that means the failure is still in progress.
“I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.” ― Thomas A. Edison
So I’m interested to explore our relationship with failure. Why do we fear it so much, why does the fear of failure hold is back to the point that we don’t do anything at all, which is in fact the ultimate failure?
When I share with people that I feel like this year has been a failure, the usual response is ‘but look what you have achieved’, ‘I’d love to have achieved what you have’, ‘at least you tried’ ‘It’s not over yet’. It is an offer of consolation, an attempt to reduce the awkwardness, to dilute the fail. We feel so uncomfortable with failure we’ll do anything to make it go away. But what is wrong with just a good massive Fail?
(Probably should point out that there is at least one person in my life whose reply was in fact ‘well do better next time”. Weirdly this felt the most encouraging. Because it was true. Comforting words are nice and kind. But sometimes harsh truths are there to either sink further or swim faster. It’s a thin line.)
But back to wallowing some more in the pool of failure. What if we were just ok with failing? That we accepted that it was part of being a human that sometimes it goes wrong, it does not work out, or perhaps the scariest thing of all to confront, that we just weren’t good enough. What if that’s all ok.
We might even need failure. What if everything just turned out as we’d hoped all the time? How would that feel? Hmmm no actually that would feel really good. We don’t really need failure, do we?
Without failure would there be celebration of achievement? Without failure would we have the energy to explore further, ask deeper questions, learn, grow? Or would we just be ok in situ, achieving what we need to?
“Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.” ― Truman Capote
Maybe it comes down to our own personal definition of failure (and success).
One person’s fail is another person’s triumph. Only you can label something a failure because only you can know what is your success.
At the Olympics we see people devastated because they only won silver or bronze but we also see people celebrating silver and bronze, even just being there. Their success is their’s to own.
“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.” ― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
I like Paulo, he is a wise man. But this quote isn’t strictly true. Sometimes we simply do not have what it takes to make the dream come true. Failing might be the moment we have to be more truthful with ourselves. And success therefore lies in the space where you can be honest with yourself. Because only you will know, do you have what it takes, did you do everything you possible could do, do you have the energy to keep going?
Failure and success are from the same family, they live together, they work together, quite frankly they really need to get their own lives, but that’s not how it works. You can not have one without the other.
So maybe if we accept we can only be successful if we are unafraid of failure then things start to get easier for us. When we can live in a space that the desire to try over shadows the fear of failing. And the fear of failing isn’t a fear anymore, it’s just an experience that we might have every now and then, a bit like stepping on Lego.
So Failure is for us to own. We can own failure as much as we can own success. No one else can tell that story for you. If you think you’ve failed then you probably have, and that’s ok. It’s what you do next that matters.
Do you let your Failure sink you, or do you reenergise, learn, reset, grow, go again?
So maybe you aren’t a failure, you just failed today. There is a difference.
And that’s where the ramble ends today.
To fail or not to fail, that is the question.
Would love your thoughts.
Eleanor
Read the book > Why losing your job could be the best thing…