Failure is an orphan (1)

“Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead-end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.” Denis Waitley

Failure is a word nobody likes to associate with. Everybody wants to relate with and be known with success but failure is an outcast we all try to ignore. Failure, they say, is an orphan. Despite the fact that nobody wants to claim any relationship with failure, failure is commonplace and virtually an integral part of life. We must not kid ourselves or hide our head in the sand by thinking we can never fail. Nobody is completely immune from failure. Everyone is susceptible to failure. For anyone to say he cannot fail or has never failed is completely untrue. Only God can never fail. The person who has never failed is a man who has not attempted to do anything significant with his life. The issue is not failing but knowing how to handle failure.

“ Failure is the stepping stone to success, as long as you learn from it. Focus on the actions needed to be taken and fail fast so that you learn what not to do. Failure shows that you are trying, it is so easy to just remain in the ‘easy zone’ just getting by living life without taking any action, but that is not how we grow as individuals.” Asad Meah

The problem we have is a wrong perception of failure. Failure refers to the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective. When we fail it does not mean we are a failure. It simply means we have not reached our destination yet. Failure is simply a mistake that we learn from. Failure is never the end of the road, it affords us the opportunity to review things and start afresh or change strategy.

Failure must be seen in the right light. Failure need not be final. Failure is an integral part of any success story. Someone said success is failure turned inside out. Someone else said failure or success is in the eye of the beholder – the way you interpret what happens to us will determine whether we have experienced failure or success.

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Success is a process which involves learning and successful learning involves a tenacity to get it right even when we miss it. Many times, there can be no success if we have not crossed the hurdle of failure. Failure can either be a bridge to abandoning one’s dream or a bridge to success. To want to go through life scarred of making mistakes or failing is an expressway that leads to insignificance.

Many times, failure will drain us of the energy and enthusiasm needed to do what we ought to do. Failure is a “demotivator” and it has the power to make us dwell on the past rather than focusing on the future. If a child who fumbles and wobbles in his attempt to transition from crawling to walking gives us at his failed attempts, he will never walk. Failure is simply failed attempts at transitioning from where we are to where we want to get to. Whenever we fail we must be determined never to give up.

Failure can be painful so we must learn to deal with the negative consequences that come with failure. When we fail we must be honest to admit we are devastated and hurt, that we are ashamed and angry. We must admit the fact that the zeal to move on has ebbed.

to be continued

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