4 Advantages Of Failure You Don’t Know About.
What if I tell you, that it’s okay to fail?
What if I tell you, that failure is not as bad as it seems?
What if I show you the good sides of failure?
In a society where people constantly harp on and celebrate success, sometimes we forget the failures that come with every “person of the year” cover story.
I don’t want to fail!!!!!!!! This has been the phrase that has brought anxiety and nervousness to a lot of people. Many people are so afraid to fail that they end up failing. In its extreme form, fear of failure is termed atychiphobia.
Atychiphobia has the capacity of crippling your productivity and creativity, it can make you excessively nervous amidst so many other consequences that is why you should terminate the fear of failure.
Failure is not synonymous with a loser, it is just an inability to reach a set target or goal. You are not a loser because you failed, you are a loser because you failed and refused to raise up again.
Let me tell you a short story of my life.
When I was in my primary school I was the best in my class, I always took the first position after each exam and that was my set target, until this particular term I was sick during the term so I was not regular in school.
Our examination for that term was scheduled to hold in three weeks time when I resumed school.
I hurried to read and did my best but I crashed from 1st position to 12th position. I cried my eyes out, I beat myself and refused to eat, my teachers became so worried that they had to give me a compensation gift before I could go home.
I felt like I had disappointed my parents though they didn’t display such but that was my mentality. I wish I knew better, I wouldn’t have fallen sick because I failed my standards, I wouldn’t have been depressed and not eat because I didn’t meet up my set target.
I was mocked by my class mates the next term on resumption, I lost some friends who thought I was now dormant and a loser but I didn’t quit, the shocker was that I went back to my position that term.
Asides from this my little story, let me share with you these popular stories of most prominent people who failed.
Colonel Sanders was rejected 1,009 times when trying to sell his fried chicken recipe. As we all know, KFC is a world-renowned franchise today and likely inspired the launch of other fried chicken companies.
Thomas Edison created 10,000 failed prototypes of his electric bulb before succeeding. As he famously said,
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.
Sylvester Stallone was rejected 1,500 times when he tried selling his script and himself for what would be the film Rocky. Stallone suffers from partial paralysis in his face which made it difficult for him to get casted in an industry that’s all about looks. Today, Rocky is one of the most successful film series of all time, grossing more than US $1 billion
Arianna Huffington got rejected by 36 publishers. It’s hard to believe that one of the most recognizable names in online publications was once rejected by three dozen major publishers. Huffington’s second book, which she tried to publish long before she created the now ubiquitously recognizable Huffington Post empire, was rejected 36 times before it was eventually accepted for publication. Even Huffington Post itself wasn’t a success right away. In fact, when it launched, there were dozens of highly negative reviews about its quality and its potential. Obviously, Huffington overcame those initial bouts of failure and has cemented her name as one of the most successful outlets on the web.
Bill Gates watched his first company crumble. Bill Gates is now one of the world’s wealthiest individuals, but he didn’t earn his fortune in a straight line to success. Gates entered the entrepreneurial scene with a company called Traf-O-Data, which aimed to process and analyze the data from traffic tapes (think of it like an early version of big data). He tried to sell the idea alongside his business partner, Paul Allen, but the product barely even worked. It was a complete disaster. However, the failure did not hold Gates back from exploring new opportunities, and a few years later, he created his first Microsoft product, and forged a new path to success.
Walt Disney was told he lacked creativity. One of the most creative geniuses of the 20th century was once fired from a newspaper because he was told he lacked creativity. Trying to persevere, Disney formed his first animation company, which was called Laugh-O-Gram Films. He raised $15,000 for the company but eventually was forced to close Laugh-O-Gram, following the close of an important distributor partner. Desperate and out of money, Disney found his way to Hollywood and faced even more criticism and failure until finally, his first few classic films started to skyrocket in popularity.
4 ADVANTAGES OF FAILURE
Take a good look at these failure stories, you will agree with me that failure is a necessity for success, every success without a failure story may lack credibility in space and time. Yes while you may argue with me that failure is not a preferable phenomenon, but its still not as bad as we make it to look, it all depends on how we view it.
1)FAILURE IS A MOTIVATOR
If you have ever succeeded before, one of your conscious or unconscious motivation was that you didn’t want to fail. A popular preacher Apostle Joshua Selman once said " failure does not give birth to failure, failure gives birth to success, all things been equal" and I agree with this statement.
Failure has a way of bringing out the last ounce of gold in you to be successful. It drives you to be better.
Hey, listen up, the next time you fail, leverage on it and motivate your self to do better, act better, work better and become the best. As Winston Churchill said: “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
2) FAILURE BROADENS YOUR UNDERSTANDING
Just like the favorite quote of Thomas Edison “I have not failed. I have just found 10,000 ways that won’t work", failure enlarges the scope of your understanding of a phenomenon. When you quest to be original and creative, it entails that you create room for failure because it will help you understand how a thing ought to and ought not to work.
It makes you have a rethink and see things from different perspectives and dimensions. Failure makes you understand the strength and weak points of a thing.
When you feel you have failed on a subject matter, it helps you understand the dynamics of that subject matter. More so, it gives you the impetus to claim authority in such subject matter because you have seen the good and the bad side and hence can even teach and mentor people.
3) FAILURE INCREASES THE SCOPE OF YOUR CREATIVITY
Better ideas don’t come until we find the old one faulty. When we fail, we tend to be more creative and think about better ways to do things. Albert Einstein once said “Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Failure forces you to rethink your approach and try something new.
Kentin Waits shared her story which gives credence to this fact. In 2007, her cushy and fairly lucrative contract position with a top tech firm came to an abrupt end. The situation forced her to re-evaluate what she wanted the future of her career to look like. She knew she wanted to keep working remotely, retain some level of employment autonomy, and (hopefully) avoid a severe pay cut. Over the next few years, she built a small, but thriving independent business, a business that likely would have never been launched had that contracting position continued without interruption.
Though she certainly couldn’t see it at the time, that job loss forced her to put something new and ultimately, more rewarding.
4)FAILURE HELPS YOU DISCERN TRUE FRIENDSHIP
True friends they say, stay with you through thick and thin. So let me ask you these simple question, how do you truly know your true friends when you have never experienced failure.
Failure helps you to check away fake relationships, those who stick to your success and not to you. You can really see them in your time of blossom, you will see the identity of fake friends when you have failed.
Feel free to connect me on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/mathias-wisdom-5bb564212
