Failing Forward
By Sojourner on 12-14-2007
“Most people achieved their greatest success one step beyond what looked like their greatest failure.”
Brian Tracy
“Many of life's failures are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
Thomas Edison
In my previous entry, I talked about taking steps to turn dreams into reality. But the biggest stumbling blocks for individuals to take steps is FEAR—particularly, fear of failure and the ironic fear of realization of their dreams. In particular, idealists are fueled and energized by the quest for identity, meaning, and self-improvement. The irony of that is when their dreams do come true, idealists are at a loss of what’s next. As a result, many idealists actually self-sabotage or procrastinate to act upon their passions. It is often easier and rosier talking about it than actually doing it. The other part is the fear of failure. What if I try my best but still fail to reach my goals or dreams? What then?
How do you overcome fear? Procrastination or day-dreaming is an escape of reality and a coping mechanism to fear. The only way to deal with it is to face it squarely. One book that I particularly like is “Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes into Stepping Stones for Success” by John C. Maxwell (Thomas Nelson, 2007). John Maxwell relayed stories after stories of individuals having to “fail” or encounter great obstacles and setbacks before succeeding. A case in point was Truett Cathy, the founder of Chick-fil-A International. He came up with the million-dollar idea “Chick-fil-A Sandwich” when he was at one of the lowest points in his life. He had lost his two brothers to a plane crash, his second restaurant had been destroyed by fire and there was no insurance coverage on that restaurant, he had to undergo surgery for polyps in his colon and was hospitalized. He turned the negative experiences in his life into positives and was recognized for bringing chicken sandwiches into the fast-food industry.
One of my favorite “The Way I See It” (quotes that are printed on the back of Starbuck’s paper coffee cup) is the following:
“Some of the best inventive moments were born out of ‘wrong thinking.’ Most people start with the right way so they all follow the same path. The wrong way will lead to mistakes from which you can learn and create new discoveries—the kind of original ideas that come to life when we dare to be different, keep an open mind and have no fear of failure.”
James Dyson (Industrial designer and inventor of the Dyson vacuum).
 |
 |
 |
 |
Posted by gemini612 on Dec 23, 2007
I like to relate achieving success to running, with success being the finish line. When one is feeling fatigued after running awhile, that person has to will himself/herself to run further to reach the finishing line. Otherwise, he or she will simply burnout. |
 |
 |
Posted by bgrimes on Dec 27, 2007
Good analogy Gemini. What makes it even tougher is that you often don't know if its a 5K or a Marathon. |
From what I have seen, fear comes from risk and the bigger the risk the more fear there is. I like Einstein's quote,"Success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" A similar theme as what you describe. If you work hard enough you might succeed but maybe not? Then how do you know? I usually get input from a variety of my friends. I am lucky to have a number of open minded friends so that has helped me. It is also interesting to see 2 businesses that are very similar and one succeeds and the other fails, the point here is that there are no substitutes for good business practices. Go out and learn as much as you can BEFORE you start spending money. If by :Mistake" you mean a creative approach then I agree however I have seen too many examples of fundamentally flawed thinking that ended up in complete failure, look at start-ups in Silicon Valley, most fail, and these do not necessarily ever lead to success. I've never met anyone who has realized all of their dreams so I don't see this, around me aynways.