Do you know the similarity between a small baby, a spider and Thomas Alva Edison?
They all have faced failures.
A baby has to fall at least 100 times before it learns how to walk, a spider spins its web every time anything happens to it and Edison famously said,
I have not failed 1000 times, I have learned how not to make a light bulb In a 1000 ways.
Everyday we try to achieve success whether it is making our first cup of tea or driving without panicking in traffic.
Anything that we want to achieve can be termed as success and the lack of success is called failure. Whenever we face failure, our happiness tends to fade away and disappointments starts becoming our friend.
There is no way that to prevent failure to a 100% but what we can do is learn how to handle it, so in this video we will talk about ways to handle failure.
Table of Content
1. Don’t try to fight your feelings
Failure is not an easy thing to face and the disappointment it brings is a heavy emotion to handle.
Whenever you must deal with failure your confidence will seem to shatter and it might look like there is no future now. These are some of the things that you might be feeling and its ok to feel those.
Having an optimistic attitude is good but always being optimistic and not dealing with your emotions can make you feel bad on the inside.
Its ok to feel disheartened and sad after facing failure. You can always ask for help and give value to your emotions.
To deal with your emotions you can write how you are feeling, talk to friends about your experience or even talk to people who have faced similar emotions and situations.
2. Don’t let your setback define you
A student was working day and night to prepare for an exam, forgetting to check his socials and even watch TV, his dedication was inspirational.
On the exam day as soon as the question paper arrived, she felt lost and blanked out which led to a low score on the marksheet.
Do you think that she was not hardworking, or lacked passion?
Do you think her failure should define her character?
No right?
A lot of what happens to us depends on the situations we end up in. There are a lot of factors beyond your control that might result in the opposite of what you hope for, but that does not equate to failure.
The student might “Fail” the particular exam, but her preparation and dedication will make her achieve wonders in the future, rendering the “Failure” to be nothing more than a setback.
3. Remember many people fail
One of the major things you can remind yourself is that you are not alone. You are not the first one to fail, and you are not the last one.
You will have to look at the stories of other people on how they dealt with their failure, and what they did to achieve success.
4. Adjust your focus
A lot of times, you might feel like you put in the work, but didn’t achieve the results you were hoping for.
You might have studied for the exams, but your marks didn’t justify your hard work.
You might have spent countless hours in the gym but didn’t get the physique you were aiming for.
This can be disheartening, but it is the time when you need to get back to the drawing board to figure out where you went wrong. A lot of times, the lack of results is the result of a lack of focus.
Maybe you studied for hours but didn’t focus enough.
Maybe you worked out day in and day out but didn’t train with enough focus. It happens to the best of the best.
But instead of feeling like the said failure is the end of the world, try figuring out your short comings, and use that to not repeat your mistakes. This brings us to our final point.
5. Use failure as a chance to grow
Once you figure out your shortcomings and where you lacked focus, you need to get yourself together, and start working on your weaknesses again.
This process can be scary at first, but it’s one sure shot way to get out of self-doubt and self-loathing.
Once you start working on yourself, you need to play the long-term game, that is, instead of treating It like a remedy or a course correction or a quick fix, treat it as a process, a process that requires investment of time and energy.
Record your daily progress in the form of journaling, and during all of this, be kind to yourself. Forgive yourself and Give yourself some time.
Failure might be fatal but it is definitely not final. I hope you don’t be afraid of new experiences in the future as failure is not final.
