How to make peace with failure in five steps

Do you like to fail? I don’t.

In fact, I hate to fail. 

It makes me feel bad. It makes me feel imperfect and flawed. I don’t like to make mistakes. Specially, I don't want to make mistakes in front of others…

I want to be perfect, and perfectionists don't like failure…

But, shouldn’t they? 

Can there be perfection without failure?

First, let me be clear, I used to love perfection, until I realized that perfection was just a way to get myself to not do something.  

If it can’t be perfect, why even bother doing it, right?

Perfection for me was also a way to procrastinate, I kept on refining things until they were perfect and in that process I never get to finish them or I kept on delaying them because there was always one more thing to add, to do, to modify…

And, what is perfection anyway? 

This idea that there is a perfect job, a perfect house, a perfect body, a perfect relationship…

It’s unattainable, it’s an impossible to reach standard… 

And, my idea of perfection is probably different from your idea of perfection, so what is it that we are reaching for? 

So, if you we are clear that perfection is a gimmick, but we still thrive to be better, can we really be better if we don't fail?

Can you learn and grow without the struggle of the failures?

Well, I think that the struggles and failures are our most important teachers. Even when we don't like them.

When you go through the hard times that’s when you get to learn and grow. But, only if you stop and take the time to see the lesson in that failure.  

I’m sure you’ve heard a thousand times the same example of the small kid that learns how to walk and doesn't just quit. You fail and fail and fail until you learn how to walk.

Yes, you’ve heard it but if you are like me, you wonder, this is all great but how do I get over the fear of failure when I am no longer a kid? 

Now that I am a grown up, how do I make myself comfortable with failure again, how do I bring back the curious kid in me?

How do I get over that awful feeling I had when I was in school? The fear that the teacher would call my name, the fear that I would forget the answer when the teacher ask me, the fear that the class would laugh at me if I responded wrongly…

You understand the need to fail, but how do you make peace with failure? How do you get over your belief that failure is bad? 

In my case, first, I needed to realize what were my beliefs around failure and perfection; I needed to understand that I grew up in an environment that was rewarding me for getting good grades instead of recognizing the effort. The school I went to had a system purely based on grades, and failing was seeing as a bad thing. You had to get good grades, study hard and pass the tests, and the pressure of failing was making you feel stupid and struggling behind, you were always comparing yourself with others and not in a good way…

What are your beliefs around failure and perfection?

Second, I needed to see if these beliefs were stopping me from accomplishing more in my life. Were they helping me or hindering me? 

Are your beliefs helping you or stopping you from growing?

Third, I needed to find different models of reality, find out what are other ways of thinking that could help me get out of my limiting belief and help me seeing the world differently. When I read the book by Carol Dweck, Mindset, it helped me figuring out that I was stuck in a fixed mindset and that I needed to switch to a growth mindset. 

Do you have a fixed or a growth mindset? What are you choosing to believe?

Fourth, I had to separate my failures from my identity. I had to realize that failing at something doesn't mean: “I am a failure”. Something that resonated with me and I just love is the quote from Judge Victoria Pratt “Failure is just an event. It is not a characteristic. People can’t be failures.” Such a great reminder!

Remember to separate the events from your identity!

And fifth, I had to get to it. I had to fail and fail and fail. And then learn from those failures. As Mel Robbins says in her great book “5 second rule” you have to increase your failure rate. Just keep at it.

Keep failing!

The more you fail the more you get used to it, the more you practice the more you get better at it. And in the process you get to improve and grow. Or, like Rachel Hollis said at a conference I attended: suck at something.  

So, you need to suck at something, you need to start doing things and be ok with the fact that you don't know what you are doing until you get to learn from the process of doing it. 

I started taking dancing classes and even though I love dancing, I still don't like the fact that I am not good at it, but I also know that if I don't practice, if I don't keep on struggling I’ll never be any good at it… just by looking at videos I will not improve my moves…

Like Neil Pasricha talks in his last book “You are awesome”, we need to grow thicker skin, we need to increase our resilience and we need to be ok with failing. 

Because when you do that, you can only get better. 

Waiting for perfection is not a successful growth plan. 

Failing and learning from failure is an investment in yourself. 

So, what’s your choice? Waiting until you become perfect or sucking at something and seeing how you grow? 

I made my choice, and I keep on reminding myself that is ok to fail every time I am at my dancing class… I still don't like it, but I see it now as my chance for growth and it helps me getting more comfortable with it. I started to make peace with failure…

Now, I’d love to hear from you below, do you like to fail? Are you afraid of failing in front of others? Have you allowed yourself to fail in epic ways? 

Let me know below!!

xoxo,

Sofia