Today, I want to to discuss setbacks, and how to recover from them. Failure is devastating to deal with, but as Denis Waitley said, “there are no mistakes or failures, just lessons”. This quote is so important in self-growth because it reaffirms the statement that there are no truly worthless experiences in life, as you learn something, whether it be positive or negative.
This is so important to keep in mind in the world of business because you have to compete with all these people that are equally, if not more qualified than you for a few select spots. It can be nerve-wracking and stressful, especially when you get a letter that starts with “we unfortunately did not”. But there are two things you can do from this. You can either wallow in this failure, or you can learn from it and evolve, both in your talents and in your character.
What does wallowing in failure do? It makes you only focus on the negatives, the things that you could have done. You learn nothing from moping in self-pity. While it’s okay to be upset or angry, at one point, you have to rethink that toxic mentality. The question you need to ask yourself is “How can I improve from this experience?” And that begins with accepting failure.
ACCEPTANCE
While it’s tempting to make up ‘what-if’ scenarios for yourself that involve you miraculously getting what you wanted on a small technicality, the odds of this happening in real life are next to none. The first step of learning is acceptance. You didn’t get the job, or the promotion, or the acceptance letter, or the yes. That’s fact. Focusing all your energy in trying to change something that has already happened is never worth it. Instead, apply this energy into reflection on your actions.
REFLECTION
Acknowledging your actions can be hard, especially when you realize some errors you may have made. Without acknowledge, you will be stuck in a rut, and set yourself up for self-decline, not self-growth. But make sure you think about the positives, too. The enthusiasm you had for that job, the connections you made, how you got to learn more about your passions. Sometimes, failure can be more valuable than landing that opportunity because it truly gives you an opportunity for self-improvement. Sometimes, a lesson is better than achievement. In my opinion, this step is the most important in moving on in your life because in order to grow, you have to fully be able to say “I didn’t get this, and I did this well, but I could have improved this”.
GROW
Once you’ve thought about what you did well and what you could have done better, the next step is to move on. It might be hard to move on from your dream job, dream school, or much-needed award. But again, your loss is concrete, but you are fully in control of what you get out of this failure. You’ve lost. It happens. LIFE happens. But you want to be able to look back at these mistakes as where you found out more about yourself and improved, not a story of resentment and bitterness and wasted energy.
Maybe you’ll find another job that somehow appeals to you more than your supposed dream job. Maybe you’ll end up loving your current position. You can go anywhere, and sometimes even end up in a better place than that success that you so badly wanted. From personal experience, my rejection from a leadership position at my school my freshman year ended up teaching me more about how to handle obstacles, grow from my experiences, and self-improvement than that position would have ever done for me. Failure is short term, growth is long term. Don’t let that short-term setback discourage your potential in the long term.
IF THEY HADN’T KEPT GOING…
If Steve Jobs had given up on his goals after Apple CEO John Sculley fired him, we wouldn’t have the powerful Apple OS, the iPod, the design of Apple hardware, or the iPhone.
If Thomas Edison had given up on the invention of the light bulb after the 999th attempt, we would not have modern electricity as it is today.
If Bill Gates had gotten a boring office job after the failure of his first company, Traf-O-Data, he would not have gone on to learn from his failure and found Microsoft, it would not be the fourth most valuable company of today.
When dealing with failure, we might be tempted to say that the greats had everything worked out for them. While that might be true, it was for a very select few. Failure is never focused on in success stories or in the media because a chain of success sounds so much better. Remember that everyone has been in this position.
To sum it up, everyone deals with failure at one point or another. The factor that separates the successful from the unsuccessful is how you rebound. Will you be discouraged, or will you use this opportunity as a stepping stone to greater opportunities?
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