Are you the type of person who gets deterred by failure or who rises up to the next challenge?
Decide who you are and then live your life accordingly, because believe me when I say there will be many failures along the way, and in the moment of failure, when that sinking feeling hits, that is when champions are made.
Not getting the result you want out of your life’s travels can either cause you to implode into a fearful, sad, beaten, good for nothing. Or it can cause you to explode into the real you, the you that get’s a ‘no’ when you knock on three doors and walks up to fourth and kicks it down.
Winston Churchill – ‘Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm’
Denzel Washington – ‘Fail big’
Someone once said, ‘if you aren’t failing you aren’t doing anything’, and they’re right. Because to grow in this world you need to step out of your comfort zone, and outside of your comfort zone is a bunch of tests that you are most likely going to fail at the first time of trying, the beauty in this hardship is; that is when you learn.
You learn three important things:
- You learn who you really are. As I said, in the moment of failure you have a choice, a choice to implode into fear or explode into greatness, whatever you choose is who and what you will become. Choose wisely.
- You learn more about whatever it is that you failed at, what you did wrong, what you could do better next time and you will now know what it feels like to fail at it, so when going up the next time you will do things differently.
- You add more fuel to the fire. Failing, being rejected or being told ‘no’ when you want something often creates even more hunger in you to go up again. Just like the baby learning how to walk, every time they fall over they get back up even more determined, and that is what failure does to winners.
So… What brought this post on?
I didn’t get the promotion at work that I’ve been working towards, and guess what? That’s okay.
Perhaps it’s just not my time, perhaps they don’t think I’m ready, maybe I’m not ready, whatever it is, I don’t have the right answer and quite frankly I don’t really care what the answer is. I do know that I’m playing the game of life, and this is a marathon, not a sprint. This is just another part of the journey towards success, like I’ve said previously, ‘success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal’. Therefore it is not about quantum leaps, it’s about consistently improving yourself and winning the small battles you face on a day to day basis that turn you into a winner.
Yes, it doesn’t feel nice to fail, but don’t be disheartened, you’re not a failure until you’ve given up. As far as I’m concerned failure is just another word for trial, these are all trials until you get to the big stage, and by that time you will have had so much practice that your success is inevitable.
so… ‘just keep swimming, just keep swimming’ (finding Nemo.. again! Lol)
‘Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared to believe something inside them was superior to circumstance’ – Bruce Barton