The Price of Eliminating Failure
| June 28, 2012 | Posted by Roshawn Watson under Uncategorized |
By: Roshawn Watson
Do you like to lose? Me neither. That said, sitting out the game because of the possibility of a loss is not a good strategy either. Our experiences shape who we are. By eliminating the possibility of failure, we may be shielding ourselves from the very adversity critical to experiencing serendipitous success, creative inspiration, and character development. These are key elements necessary to catapult us towards greater achievement. According to author Paul Tough, “the struggle to pull (ourselves) through a crisis, to come to terms on a deep level with (our) own shortcomings, and to labor to overcome them — is exactly…” what is needed to achieve uncommon success (New York Times). Here are some reasons you should not be afraid of failure.
Don’t let the fear of losing be greater than the excitement of winning. Robert Kiyosaki
Mistakes Lead You to Answers
Perhaps one of the most intuitive reasons to not fear failure is because mistakes can lead you to valuable answers. Success can be very iterative. Henry Ford stated it this way: “Failure is the opportunity to begin again, more intelligently.” Perhaps, there is no better illustration of this point than Thomas Edison’s journey to invent the light bulb. He reportedly persisted through 1000 experiments that didn’t work. He framed the process as learning a thousand ways to not conduct the experiment. Another interesting example is Alexander Fleming, the scientist who discovered penicillin. When he left his lab in August for a family vacation, he was not expecting for the cultures of staphylococci that he left on the bench to have differential growth patterns. One culture became contaminated with fungus, which killed the bacteria immediately surrounding it. This coincidental observation led him to purify the bactericidal substance within the fungus. That’s when he realized that it could kill a variety of bacterial pathogens, and the rest is history. While in no way am I diminishing his, Edison, or Ford’s brilliance, but trial and error coupled with serendipity were certainly key factors in their successes.
Clearly, failure represents opportunity and growth, not deficit and loss. Fred Tracy
Creativity Inspired by Pain
Creativity doesn’t necessarily come on demand. It comes by inspiration. Sometimes that inspiration is born from pain associated with failure. For example, with over 36 million albums sold, pop star Kelly Clarkson obviously knows a thing or 2 about making music that resonates with her fans. However, she recently indicated that her new boyfriend was ruining her creativity. After all, it is hard to write heartbreak anthems when you are happy. She quipped “I’m trying to write a tough song, and it is coming out like butterflies and rainbows.”
Related Article: Your Do Over Guide: What Would You Do Differently
Of course I’m not suggesting that you deliberately set out to fail, just for the experience (that would be totally sadistic!); however, you shouldn’t avoid taking advantage of opportunities because of the possibility of failure either. If Alfred Tennyson never was tremendously grieved by the passing of his beloved friend, he would not have written In Memoriam, a collection of poems often cited as some of the greatest lyrical poetry ever written on grief. His masterpiece has comforted countless others dealing with the loss of a loved one. By limiting the possibility of failure, you may be muzzling your own creative voice.
Build Resolve from the Struggle
Another reason to not fear failure is because of the performance character it builds within you. Perhaps this point is best illustrated by looking at the school system. The old adage is “school is a place where former A students teach mostly B students to work for C students.” The underlying premise is that academic success doesn’t seem to translate well to real world success. David C. McClelland wrote: “Researchers have in fact had great difficulty demonstrating that grades in school are related to any other behaviors of importance – other than doing well on aptitude tests…It seems so self-evident to educators that those who do well in their classes must go on to do better in life that they systematically have disregarded evidence to the contrary that has been accumulating for some time.” As Sarah Scott accurately pointed out, “high school grades were never designed to assess the qualities that make you a success in the working world (Huffington Post).”
Related Article: Keys to Moving Past Failures
Thomas Stanley research supported these statements, as he found the average millionaires in his cohort had a high school GPA of 2.92 on a 4.00 scale (N=715).1 Robert J Sternberg further argued “nevertheless, between 75 percent and 96 percent of the variance in real world criteria, such as job performance, cannot be accounted for by individual differences in intelligence test scores.” The point is very clear: those who are successful in the real world possess intelligence that isn’t adequately captured by school grades or standardized testing.
We must recognize that “character is at least as important as intellect. Angela Duckworth
Increasingly, we are learning that creativity and performance character (zest, optimism, emotional and social intelligence, and most importantly tenacity and self-control) play key roles in real world success. Unfortunately, even when we recognize that performance character attributes are lacking, we dare not mention this fact at the risk of offending someone or hurting his esteem, especially in academic environments. The very actions that we use to protect someone’s feelings places him at a disadvantage, as he is becoming ill-equipped to deal with difficulties. We need the struggle, “some challenge, some deprivation… (to) overcome, even if just to prove to (ourselves) that (we) can (New York Times).” When we are inoculated from failure, we harm ourselves. A staggering 93% of millionaires stated that the most important lesson they learned from school was: “hard work was more important than genetic high intellect in achieving.” Notice, that speaks to tenacity and self-control not intelligence. Tenacity is 1 of the top 2 characteristics most millionaires learn during their school days. Thus, by refusing to take chances, we may be robbing ourselves of the capacity to thrive during hardship. We are missing the opportunity to build our performance character.
Related Article: Fail
Closing Thoughts
I submit to you to embrace the journey to become more. Don’t discount the tremendous value in the struggle, even if that struggle is to achieve, maintain, or regain success. Otherwise, you are embracing your fear of failure and diminishing your opportunities to make mistakes that lead to subsequent victories, enhance your creativity, and develop your character. When you have an opportunity to “go for it” or to “go home, will you risk failure to achieve extraordinary success or to be complacent with mediocrity?
…there is no way to completely eliminate (failure) because…the same circumstance that presents the potential to fail also serves as a gateway to the opportunity to succeed. You cannot close the door on the former, without also closing the door on the latter. Jonathan Fields
Lastly, if you like this article, please subscribe to my FREE email updates or RSS feed (reader), Retweet it, Like It on Facebook, Tipd it, Fark it, Stumble it, and tag it on Delicious. Also, click here to receive my eBook for FREE.
Related Articles
Your Do Over Guide: What Would You Do Differently
Keys to Moving Past Failures
Back to School Round Up
Fail
1 N = number of subjects
Why is it that we shield people from criticism. While I'd argue that giving effective criticism is an art form, there's a good reason celebrities like Gordon Ramsay and Simon Cowell are so widely followed: people like to hear the blunt, honest truth.
That's a fabulous observation. I do think that some people are not particularly gifted at giving criticism, such as the guys that you mentioned.
Criticism is sometimes hard to receive, yet what it can birth in us, if we receive it properly, can make us so much better. I think it is great when we decide to prove the skeptics wrong and are successful. Sometimes it takes someone telling you what you cant do to realize that you must do.
…when not directed at them! It is great to watch when Ramsay is swearing at someone on TV.
Maria, too funny. I have never had the "pleasure."
I can't stand when people do this to their kids!!! My husband is a stroke judge for the swim team and I laugh when a parent whines at Jeff for TEACHING THEIR CHILD! Sure, he DQ'ed your kid, but he also walked over and said "This is what you did wrong and this is how you can fix it for next time." I feel so sorry for the kids who get coddled like that. They're going to have such a hard time in life. When someone criticizes you, you should say "thank you" and then work on it. If they didn't care, they wouldn't say a word.
-M
Michelle,
I know exactly where you are coming from. It used to be people didn't want you to hit their children (rightfully so in a lot of cases), but now, you have to be careful to even tell a child no without some overprotective parent telling you that you are not supposed to be disciplining their child (excuse me, I just told him no). Anyway, we empower kids to fail with this attitude. One reader told me that part of the reason so many people got ticked with this post is because it hit them on a very personal level. I guess they are guilty as charged.
If you aren't willing to face failure then you'll never know your limits. Years from now that could come back and haunt you. High schoolers may wonder if they could have made the debate team, baseball team, or even straight As. Ask the girl of your dreams for a date. You may look back 30 years later and see it as your best move ever. If you're rejected don't give up – try again – you may grow on her. Don't automatically assume that you have failed because you did something wrong. There are historical examples of brilliant people failing exams because they were smarter than the graders.
That's another fabulous observation. I do think many people are filled with regret because they assumed that a lost battle meant that the war was over. Unfortunately, they retreated too soon. Our lack of resolve causes us to sell ourselves short
BTW, I absolutely loved your example of people who got the answers wrong because they were smarter than the graders. While I am not suggesting that was my case, I definitely did my fair share of challenging grades where I thought that the faculty had to myopic of interpretation of the possibilities. Sometimes it was EXTREMELY fruitful.
Failures are just a part of life. If you open your mind up and try new things, then you'll have some failures. That's fine and we can learn from the experience. If we just stick with what we know, then we won't fail much, but we won't grow either. It has taken me a long time to embrace failures. 🙂
Amen, it is difficult to accept failure as a part of life. I think the alternative is that you can have unusual expectations. Personally,l I would rather operate off of faith than failure, but for some people, they choose to just play it safe. Those people are not even in the game. Like you say, they don't grow.
I think failure is very natural and something that can't be avoided. There are always things we can' anticipate or plan for and we don't control the universe. I like to use failure as a learning experience. I always come out a better person after I have failed at something. It is almost like failure is necessary to succeed.
I think people who try to avoid failure often have very limited success. Now, I don't mind someone being full of faith, but I do mind people so fearful of failure that they never take a chance. Those are the people who I am very concerned about. They "think" they are playing it safe, but in actuality, they are at the most risk.
Every time I am faced with a difficult choice, I realize that it's a great learning opportunity. Failure is similar, as you pointed out. I know I can't be perfect, but who can, right? The best part of your article is the part where you emphasized not letting fear of failure hold you back.
That's a great point. We can definitely learn from our missteps. I think the reason why I focus on not letting the fear of failure stop you, is because it is something that I have dealt with so much. It is easy not to start because we're so busy trying to make sure that everything is perfect or that there is no chance of loss. Well, for most things, there is a chance of loss, and that's okay. That's how we learn (as you said) and grow (as Joe mentioned). Thanks so much for your comment.
If you are doing anything you are likely to make mistakes. Successful people makes mistakes, but keep trying until they succeed.
Thanks so much for bringing the conversation back to practical utility. That really is a fabulous summary. We don't admire successful people because they have never failed. We admire them because they didn't stop.
If you are doing anything, you will make mistakes. Successful people make mistakes, but keep trying until they succeed.
There is not much I could disagree with in this article (as much as I would like to engage in one of my favourite activities and pick a discussion with you). Just out of curiousity, do you think there may be shortcut to all this? We may be able to eliminate failure but starting to see it as 'learning opportunity'; I know it works for me.
Maria,
I love going deeper in the material too, so it is always nice to chat. I definitely think that there are short cuts, but probably the biggest one I know is to become a student of history. You are still learning by failure… just not as much by your own failures. I will be talking about this in an upcoming project. It's still many months away from release, but this topic is near and near to my heart.I also think that keeping the right perspective, just as you say, is a very cool way to make sure that you get the right lessons. Often, we don't get the answers because we're simply not looking for them.
It's important to celebrate failures as much, or more so than our successes. Failure is the mother of success.
Thanks so much for your comment! I do think that the paths for success and failure are often intricately linked. It is sad when we think that we're forsaking failure only to become one.
I think failure is an important part of success, simply because perfect knowledge and foresight is not possible. It's through failure that we learn to grow and strive toward the light. One mistake can be trying to be too perfect and thus being afraid of taking the steps to grow, because of a fear of failure.
Honestly, this is something that I think of often. I'm very much of a hopeful optimist, so I deal with this from the faith area probably more than many people. That said, how could I ever do anything that significant if I never did anything that had the potential for failure? That's why your point hist home. It is through the possibility of failure that we strive for the like.
Nature demands that we struggle, we have to fight for our survival all the time. Imagine if the world were actually a 'garden of eden' where all our needs were met effortlessly – no struggle, no mistakes, no ambition…no life! The world we have is definitely to be embraced, failures and all.
Drew, I'm conflicted when I read your comment. I know where you are coming from, yet I think I would be fine with paradise with some qualifications. I could think of nothing better than a perpetual garden of Eden; however, we must be "right" in order to not tear it down to our present levels. I think that is always the risk with perfect places for imperfect people.
One of my proudest moments came when I got over "myself" and learned from my prior mistakes to make some really rocking decisions. After all, those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it!
Elizabeth, I can understand this wholly. It is heard. It necessitates a paradigm shift. Although people are excited about us, it is not all about us. If we can move beyond the people in the mirror, we can do great things.
I find it very interesting that creativity often comes from pain as you point out. So many artists, musicians and even comedians have dark sides that they attribute to their success. Maybe that's why my attempts at art have failed miserably – I can't locate my dark side.
Thanks so much for highlighting this fact. If you not artistic because you haven't experienced real pain, then good for you 🙂
I appreciate your comment. Cheers!
Good article! I like your point on "Creativity Inspired by Pain". It's easy to think that the geniuses of our time just woke up with ideas and forget that they struggled and turmoiled to succeed. I recently wrote a similar article on my blog called "Never Give Up".
"Our lives are defined not by the challenges we encounter, but by how we respond to those challenges." ~Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Thank you so much for the comment John! I will make sure to check out your post later today. That is an awesome quote; I'll definitely add it to my repertoire. Thanks for sharing!
[…] related to lack of confidence is fear. Fear of failure can be logical, but we often lose perspective. For example, anyone over 12 years old has made financial mistakes. […]
[…] with our current lender. Here are the details.” Roshawn Watson from Watson Inc presents The Price of Eliminating Failure, and says, “The struggle to pull (ourselves) through a crisis, to come to terms on a deep […]