The Tough Truth for Success Seekers–Failure Is Under-Rated
If you have had no major failures in your life, it is tantamount to admitting that you have never pushed yourself to go anywhere close to your potential. Life is funny…success is born of failure and greatness is born of imperfection. Consider a business example: “Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” (Donald Porter, V.P. British Airways.) Research shows that when a business wins back a disgruntled customer, that customer tends to be far more loyal than before, and more so than the average customers who were never disappointed.
You don’t have to perfect to be great. Strangely, if you were perfect, you could not be great. If you couldn’t fail and everything you attempted had to succeed, then that kind of success would become status quo! Human greatness is attributed only to those who, despite being frail, fearful and failure-prone, rise to the task and achieve excellence anyway.
Consider which of these you would regard as being greater—the rich kid who grows up to buy a mansion, or the poor, orphaned child who struggles to pay for education, overcomes class discrimination, starts a business and then, one day buys a mansion? The greatness is not in the mansion, but in the human ingenuity to transcend circumstances and achieve excellent outcomes.
If you have had major failures in life, congratulations! You now possess the raw material of greatness, but you must learn and respond to your failures as you rise to go again. And at all cost: “Let’s not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary.” (Paul of Tarsus, 4 BC – 64 BC, Letter 6:9 to the Galatians.)
QUESTIONS: Does this mean that failure is inherently a good thing? And what about the kind of failure from which you cannot recover?
What are your thoughts on the matter? Input below….
Failures, constrains and conflicts are all part of the reality of life. What is is important is how we react to these events in our lives.
I don’t believe that failure is inherently a good thing Or Bad For That matter. However, their is a dynamism that exist between failure and success. Knowledge, data and “right” execution is no guarantee for success neither is not exerting oneself appropriately will result in failure. With that said, I do believe in a conscious and conscientious effort to force success in your direction. If you want a cake one must exert themselves in putting the raw ingredients nature gives together though at the risk of your cake being flat, under baked or even burnt to a crisp. Although you may not ever recover from some of your own failures, they may serve as lessons for those who come after. Leaders especially parents can testify to this in raising their children.
“I don’t believe that failure is inherently a good thing Or Bad For That matter.”
Interesting thought Stephen. We are the ones who give emotional value to these circumstances, based on how we respond.
I agree that failure is a good thing and helps one in growing. Managing the risk exposure is important in all this to mitigate against failures that you cannot recover from…
Failure could inherently be a good thing; even if it is the kind of failure that one cannot recover ultimately depends on an individual’s self awareness and belief in ones self. Depending on the individual perspective -optimist vs pessimist; the optimist may see failure as an opportunity for growth or change of direction as oppose to the pessimist who sees doom and gloom and accept ‘failures’ as their reality!
I agree that failure is a part of growing. We all grow by the amount of challenges we face. When we are faced with failure it is the deciding moment when we see if we are strong enough to get up, dust ourselves off and try again, or give up. Staying down is not supposed to be an option if you want to grow. Failure isn’t suppose to break us, but to strengthen us and push us forward.
Well said, Sharon
The question of whether failure is good or bad turns on what occasioned it and the ability to rise from the attendant fallout. The work must be done before venturing out. Some failures are born of a lack of preparation or very little preparation
Failures also arise even in the context of preparation. How we respond to failure is what really matters. Do we fail forward or do we succumb to failure. If we grasp the former then with greater wisdom we can rise from the ashes and reach for success.
Failure is often times not welcomed especially in this age where people are constantly valued by their achievements or accomplishments in life. So it is no surprise that failure is under-rated; everybody wants to be valued highly. I struggled with a lot of failures in the past but I never gave up. I see failure as a process. The key to overcoming failure is to have a healthy view or opinion of yourself. We must be mature enough to know that our circumstances does not define who we are, and neither does the opinion of other people. So when someone encounters failure, they must be cognizant that the goal is to get through the process no matter how many times s/he may fail at a project, a course, a relationship and so on.
Some people, like I, believe some failures cannot be recovered from. If that is true,the challenge is to discern which failures are truly catastrophic. Otherwise, fear of the unknown will lead to too much conservatism.
Munair, you are right. Every principle demands wisdom or it can be poorly applied. The secret is to know which mistakes/failures are final and avoid them, while allowing the others to run their course as teachers.