Did you know that the first entrepreneurial venture of Bill Gates bombed? Still, this failure did not preclude his dream to make it big. He learnt from his past mistakes and rose above all challenges to lay the foundation of success, what is today known as Microsoft.
It sounds vaguely philosophical, but the most inspirational success stories have resulted from failures.
Each one of us desires for the stars. There’s nothing wrong about wishing success to kiss your feet. Unfortunately, unlike whipping up your instant coffee in minutes, success takes its own sweet time to come to you. It is a journey that is an amalgam of perseverance, positive thinking and most importantly, failures. Ah, there it is. Failure - the most dreaded word in our life’s dictionary.
Failures and success are the two sides of the same coin. When you flip the coin, the probability of experiencing failures is same as that of tasting success. So, whether you like it or not, failure is impossible to ignore. But, it is definitely not impossible to learn from your failures!
Just imagine - if Thomas Edison or Steve Jobs had given up on their experiments, could we have been enjoying our life without the light bulbs or iPhones?
Failures introduce us to the most successful ingredients of success -
1. Discovering True Self
It is during the darkest, the most frustrating and the most depressing moments of our life that we discover our inner self – our strengths and weaknesses.
2. Learn from Mistakes
Failures communicate feedback on our mistakes. They give us time to brood on our mistakes; to improvise on them through trials and errors; and to ensure not to repeat them again.
3. Explore New Things
Failures give us an opportunity to try things differently the next time. It helps in polishing your approach and taking more intelligent and calculated risks in the future. It shows what works and what doesn’t.
4. Gives a Reality Check
If you have been acting too overconfident or blind in your pursuit of success, you may not be able to foresee probable defeats or challenges coming your way. However, a knee-jerk reaction in the form of failures can keep you grounded.
5. Not the End of the World
Yes, failure is bad. It is one of the worst things that could happen in your way to success. What really matters is to fix your mistakes and move ahead in your life. The famous literary poet and critic, George Edward Woodberry aptly describes this, "Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure."
Remember, success is only a temporary state of mind. Once you reach the peak of your life, business or career, your learning becomes stagnant. Success makes you complacent. It rusts your skills. It is intoxicating like wine, but it bereaves you of your judgment.
The real learnings come through the failures that you have encountered during the process of getting there on the top.