Words matter. We all deal with fears of many kinds. Many deal with the words: fear of failing.
Failing in school. Failing at work. Failing with loved ones. We all have our stories. However, failure is not what most people think it is. Here are a few perspectives that will make you think differently about failure.
Failure doesn’t mean I’m a failure ………. It does mean
… I have learned something
… I had enough faith to experiment
… I dared to try something new
… I need to try something differently
[John Maxwell]
During the process of inventing the lightbulb, a journalist questioned Thomas Edison – “Mr. Edison, you have failed over 300 ways to invent your lightbulb. Aren’t you going to quit? Mr. Edison responded … son, I have not failed once. I HAVE learned 300 ways on how NOT to make a lightbulb” Thomas Edison story.
“If you think you can, or, if you think you can’t …. You’re right! [Henry Ford]
A Marine Sargent in Afghanistan was in charge of leading his platoon to create a voting process for the local people. Everyone was aware that they would not be successful. His direction was: “Fail Fast! Do your best at what you think is needed – document the results – bring your experience back to the platoon in our daily after-action-review. We will learn from each other and go back out the next day and Fail Fast again.” The platoon achieved their objective in a shorter time than was expected.
So. Your choice moving forward – decide a perspective for ‘failure’. Then behave expecting to learn and grow from the experience.