Failure is the new success
A statement that you’ve probably never heard before or if you’re lucky enough you’ve heard it a few times already. What this statement means for me is the ability to re-frame failure; re-framing how we’ve been conditioned to look at our failures and successes. We live in the age of ‘hustle’ culture where if you’re not doing more than your competitor you’re automatically failing. We wear our victories in the external world as a badge of honor, but what if we were to wear our failures the same way?
Everyone has a different definition for success and failure. The metrics we measure success against commonly include money, fame, prestige, reputation and luxury. So by definition if failure is the lack of success, if you don’t have any of the above you automatically don’t consider yourself successful. But now, what if we look at failure differently? For example, I start a business that I’m extremely passionate about but it fails, would I have been better off if I hadn’t even attempted it? The answer is no. The lessons that failures teaches you outnumber the lessons success can ever teach you. You can’t define yourself by your wins alone because it took so many losses to get that one win. In this context those losses could be considered stepping stones, preparing you to reach your goals but because the term failure is so deeply ingrained in our minds and has such a negative connotation to it, we take a couple hits and stop trying. Believe it or not if you keep going even after you fail and you continue to fail forward, you’re building momentum which will eventually lead you to your goals. Bringing in the first Law of Motion by Isaac Newton -Objects in motion/rest remain in motion/rest until external force is applied. This basically puts into perspective the concept of momentum. If you’ve already started working on your goals and you keep going, it’s difficult for you to give up very easily. Whereas, if you take one hit in the beginning and stop, it will be difficult for you to start again. The first step is always the hardest because it requires enormous amount of commitment, discipline and effort. For example, when you start going to the gym it is so difficult for you to stay consistent because the effort is so much whilst the results haven’t showed up yet. But eventually, you gain momentum and your body adapts to this new lifestyle and suddenly those changes are more visible than ever.
What if failure is an illusion and there’s just two things to consider on your way to achieving your goals; things that do work and things that don’t work. Labeling an event as a failure is the only thing that actually stops you from realizing your full potential. Many people use that as an excuse to not even try. I bet you’ve heard people say “if I’m not going to win why even try. “ This definition of failure has been passed down to us from generation’s way before us, the choice to re-frame it as something advantageous and beneficial solely depends upon you.
In an era of instant gratification and so many distractions and picture perfect lives on social media it’s easy to fall into this trap of defining your worth through other peoples successes. Someone else’s success doesn’t equate to your failure. It takes a lot of self-reflection and putting yourself and needs first to understand what is it that YOU truly want out of life, not what others tell you you should want. Treat your failures as stepping stones and enjoy the journey towards your goals. The pursuit is the reward, once you understand that everything around you starts to change simply because your perspective has changed. What if you’re the one you’ve been waiting on all this time? And your goals are just a by-product of the process of your becoming. There are no failures, just checkpoints and events after events shaping you into the person you need to be in order to achieve what you’ve set out to achieve.
I would like to end this short read with a quote by the one and only Rocky Balboa- Going in one more round when you don’t think you can-that’s what makes all the difference in your life.
