Several days each week, I publish short musings designed to inspire, motivate, entertain, and educate bloggers. Click here for free updates.
What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?
What feats of strength would you attempt? What mountains would you climb? What oceans would you swim?
Would you run a marathon?
Would you write the great American novel?
Would you ask that cute barista out for a date?
If we knew we couldn’t fail, there’s probably nothing we wouldn’t try.
Bungee jumping and skydiving, acts of insanity ordinarily deemed reckless, would suddenly be fun hobbies. Quitting the rat race and pursuing your passion, a leap of faith that seemed too scary, would instantly become the norm.
But alas, we can fail. We do fail. A lot.
And because we can, many of us choose not to try.
We’ll dream of writing a book, but we never do. We’ll talk about quitting our job, but we get up every morning and drive to work. We’ll go to Starbucks several times a week even though we don’t like coffee, but we never say “I seem to have lost my phone number – can I have yours?”
Yes, we refrain because we’re afraid. It’s more than that, though. A big reason many of us refrain is because we’re taught “failure is not an option.” And, long ago, we realized the easiest way to eliminate failure as a possibility is to refrain from doing things that stretch us.
We don’t write a book because publishers might reject it. We don’t turn our passion project into our vocation because we have bills to pay. We don’t say “hi” because she might say “no.”
“If I don’t try, I can’t fail” is the mantra of many of us.
Sound logic, but it’s incomplete.
Failure isn’t inherently bad. It isn’t something to avoid. It is an option.
Failure is a lesson learned. It’s an opportunity taken. It’s the precipice of our future success.
When we refuse to even try, we deprive ourselves of those lessons. We turn our back on opportunities. We miss out on successes.
The journey to success is filled with victories, yes, but also failures.
If you want to succeed, you have to be willing to fail. And when you fail, which you will do more times than not, you have to learn from it so you can try again.
So…
Are you ready to fail?
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Yup, am totally ready to fail….and savor the small victories along the way. Thanks for reminding us….if you want to succeed, you have to show up and do the work. The first step will be a killer, you can just count on that.
Another great motivational post, Kevin.
Hey Kevin,
Love your short posts!
Thank you for giving me my morning dose of motivation.
It is true that we are afraid of failures and we don’t want to fail at all costs – but if the thought of failing is stopping us from – doing stuff – it is best to try and fail, rather than not try at all.
Lessons learned from Failures are the best lessons of life – and most of the success too, comes from attempting something without worrying about failure.
thanks,
Uttoran Sen,
Hey Kevin,
Ah, if only we knew we would never fail. Wouldn’t that be awesome! Okay, on the other hand it would never challenge us either because failure is a part of success.
I know there are so many people out there that would prefer to have things the easy way. I have my moments too, I’m not going to lie to you. But failing forward is what makes us appreciate the victories in life. Had I not gone through what I have I couldn’t appreciate where I am today!
I’ve done the work, I’ve failed many times but I’m still here helping others realize what they can achieve too.
Bravo for this smart sensible inspirational post Kevin. Now let’s see how many others are eager to keep failing forward.
~Adrienne
Hi Kevin,
Hmm, let’s see now: If I knew I couldn’t fail… there are just too many things :).
Actually, probably not a lot. Certainly, none of those extreme sports junkie activities like bungee jumping, free running up mountains and then throwing myself off with nothing but thin air to catch me.
For me, it’s keeping on facing my anxiety and lack of confidence head on to do what I love most, teaching people to sell by the super power of words put together in such a way that they persuade people to succeed.
You’re right, too much has been dealt with that mantra of failure is not an option. I was thinking about this just this weekend actually. Failure has to be an option because it’s part of the winning process. I mean, think of the inventions and progress we’ve made because people took the option to fail until they got it right? What if Marie Curie had thought, “Bla! This radium thing, isn’t working! I’m going to become a baker instead.” Or Edison has thought, “Bla, this light thing doesn’t work! I’m off to Hollwood!” The list is endless.
As you say, they succeeded because they accepted failure as part of the process.
I’d add that it’s important to include small wins because these keep you going. Small wins keep you motivated and increase your confidence to go for bigger wins.
Yes, I’m ready to fail. But my goal is to know what I want to achieve and why. And to create a measure for how I’ll know when I’ve got it.
-Tom
Hi Kevin
Very inspirational post and I love the tweetable quote in it.
It is an old saying that if avoid running just in fear of failing you can never become a good athlete and will always be a snail pacer.
Quitting is real failure and nothing is ahead of it; until we are struggling no one can stop us from succeeding eventually.
All must get success but practically many people don’t get it just because they can’t wait and quit again and again ultimately become a quitter.
Thanks a lot for sharing this very lovely post.
Have a great week
Hi Kevin,
Failure is nothing more than an opportunity at success!
I have never learned through success nor have I ever met anyone else that did as well. We celebrate success, we enjoy success but we never stop to learn from it because what we learned worked.
I was just recently watching a show where the interviewee was Fran Tarnkenton – a fantastic hall of fame quarterback for the Minnesota Vikings in the 1970’s.
He went to three super bowls and lost them all.
You know what he said; the night of the loss he immediately started researching and wondering what he could have done to help his team. What did he do that contributed to those losses?
He said he never did that when they won
Why?
Because they won and celebrate the wins.
Failure is only failure when we refuse to learn from what happened and strive to get better at what we do.
Fantastic post Kevin!
BTW – I love the look of the site and it’s good to see you blogging. I haven’t been around as much and it’s really good to catch up with you!
Have a great week Kevin!
~ Don Purdum
Kevin, failure is a part of life. From the time we are born, we fail, then fail a bit more, then succeed.
When we learn to walk, we fall down.
When we learn to ride a bike, we wipe out.
When we learn to cook, we burn food.
Life is FULL of failures… and, as adults, we forget that failing is a PART of succeeding.
Thanks for reminding me of that!
It sure makes success easier to understand!
Hi Kevin,
Your entry is so on course…
Unfortunately, the idea that failure is something inherently bad starts at school when it is even punished and not encouraged…
My little boy taught me a ton of lessons just before he started crawling and walking…he failed more than a hundred times and it seems each failure only fueled his desire to try once more! I sincerely wonder why many people fail to heed the lessons of failure!
For my boy, if he had not failed, there is no way he would have ever walked… 🙂 so is it with life and everything…
Do make the day great!
Always,
Akaahan Terungwa
Hi kevin,
I’come to the place in my life where I know with all certainty that failure is not a bad thing; In fact, the more you fail, the higher the chances that you’d succeed.
Consultants are people who have failed so much that people are willing to pay them to teach them how not to fail or how to minimize their failures by avoiding the routes they took where they failed.
So all of a sudden, failure is not bad.
What is bad is inaction and indecisiveness.
Thanks for sharing.
Dan