Rockin' Life - page 8

For a long time, I thought failure was a terrible thing. In fact, I thought it was so horrible that I was deeply afraid of it and did nearly everything to avoid it.

Yep, I was that shy kid in class who never said a word unless I absolutely, positively knew I’d say the correct answer. Failure was not an option.

Well guess what? Failure happens. I’ve learned that it’s not a bad thing. I now believe that we actually learn more if we fail. It stick in our memory better. When you have to hustle in order to fix a problem you’ve created and admitted to, you don’t forget and you promise yourself not to make that mistake again.

Failure is something we pick up along the way. A baby learning to walk isn’t afraid it’s going to fail. The baby just wants to move forward and doesn’t worry about it he/she is going to fall down. Could you imagine what would happen if we fell once when we were learning to walk and decided to not get back up because it was just too scary? We learn about failure as we grow older and the people around us tell us, “Don’t touch the stove; it’s hot.” and we touch it and get burned. We learn that the people around us are right and we should listen to them. But then what happens? They come and coddle us, fix our ouch with a band-aid, and tell us we should have listened. If our loved one is right and we are wrong, we feel guilt; we really should have listened! We were bad. Guilt and the feeling of being wrong is what backs the emotion of failure. We don’t want to disappoint our loved ones. We don’t want them to tell us that we should have listened to them.

Rocks don’t throw off the shackles of failure. It’s safer not to move. If you take no action, you can’t disappoint yourself. Well, not until you’re on your deathbed wishing you’d lived your life differently.

Rockers realize the only real disappointment is disappointing yourself. After all, only you can make yourself happy and only you can make yourself feel disappointed.

When you’re not afraid of failure, you have more room to experiment and tinker. Yes, it’s nice to have a safety net below you just in case, but sometimes that’s not an option. Sometimes you just have to take steps in the dark and hope it all works out. If it doesn’t, pick yourself up, make new choices (remember, you always have your decisions — you choose), and take a different path. But when it does work out, you’ll feel like a winner.

We’re not meant to always be successful. Sometimes that path isn’t right for us. But we always learn exactly the lessons we need to know. Rarely have I learned something in one part of my life that I haven’t used in another area.

What can you try today? Do something small. Just release the fear you’ve had about failing and do it. You will feel yourself move forward and you will feel like a winner.