Learn From Failures

We are afraid of failing, so much so that, at times, we do not undertake because we are not sure of achieving our objectives. They say that when Thomas Alva Edisson presented one of his inventions – the light bulb – someone told him that to achieve his success he had failed many times, to which he replied:  “I have not failed; I know many ways not to make a light bulb ”. Learning from failure can be extremely rewarding.

If we check the statistics, ninety percent of new products fail, yet new products keep coming onto the market. Why is it like this? Because it is necessary to err to learn and do better next time. Without this, we would have no chance.

It is impossible to succeed without first failing

We admire many successful people, but are we aware of how many failures they had to learn from? We only see the result of a path that, most likely, has not been especially easy.

That is the spirit that we have to incorporate into failure; We are doomed to fail many more times than to succeed, but if we are able to learn each time, failure will make sense in itself.

Failure is the norm, we have to learn to live with failure because it is part of our reality and it is inescapable. It is necessary to go through a path of erroneous tests to achieve our goal and, in most cases, when we are very tired of failing so much, of failing so much, it is when we are closest to achieving what we want.

If we think that talent is something fixed, we will see failure as a lost opportunity to show how much we are worth, it will be a painful and counterproductive experience. Instead of learning from failure, we will develop a fear that will paralyze us.

But if we think that talent is incremental, that it is the result of tensions, challenges, mistakes and efforts, when we fail we will not feel it as a form of humiliation, but a way of stretching our limits, of reaching further, to increase our possibilities.

Let’s take the first step out of our comfort zone

Without failure there are no improvements, so  congratulate yourself for having tried more than for the results achieved. Congratulate yourself, too, for what you have learned in this effort, which will allow you not to make this mistake in the future, and congratulate yourself because, if you persist, you will arrive.

In the comfort zone, where we have everything under control, you don’t fail, but you don’t grow either. We are limited by our own safety. We must make a conscious and deliberate effort to go out and face the unknown, what we do not master, the failure that will lead us to our goal, making us strong and creative.

This requires great willpower, as learning from failure is not always an easy task. We have to deal with insecurity, with the fear of rejection, with the fear that others will laugh at our stumbling blocks and the lack of support for it. You have to put aside all fear and move on whatever happens. The stones on the road are a help, not a reason to turn back.

Believe in yourself, in your abilities, in your talents, in your possibilities and go out, knowing that you will fail, because that is how you will grow. And if it is not too much to ask, make a list of the things that you can do better or that you do not dare and would like, choose one or two and go for it.