Failure is new way of learning

Failure is new way of learning

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, failure means alack of success.

[2] The logical assumption that follows is that you’re only successful when you reach your end goal. In other words, the process doesn’t matter. It’s spelled out in black or white terms: it’s either success or it’s failure. This disempowering definition is one of the primary reasons why people fear and despise failure.

You could argue that it’s all just semantics, but language shapes your behavior, so it’s important to use the right, empowering words. You might consider the following few paragraphs a bit esoteric, but please bear with me and you’ll probably start seeing failure in a new light.If you face a difficult problem and you tell yourself, “I don’t know how to deal with it,” you’ll think of reasons why you can’t do it — and not potential solutions. Your brain acts on your instructions, and it’s the words you use that steer your thinking process. How likely are you to solve the problem if you’re wasting energy coming up with excuses? If instead you tell yourself, “Okay, let’s find a way to figure it out,” you’ll think of potential solutions and probably solve the problem. Same problem, different words, different outcome.Let’s illustrate this with a quick example: John and Kate want to start a business. Both come from the same background and have the same exact resources at their disposal. John says: “If only I had money, I could start a business.”

His disempowering vocabulary “if only” fine-tunes his brain to come up with further excuses why he can’t start a business. Instead of telling herself “if only,” Kate says: “I don’t have money, and this means I need to figure out how to bootstrap my business.”Her brain receives high-quality instructions and she comes up with several ideas to start a business on a shoestring. Same problem, different words, different] outcome.

By Martin Meadows