When You Fail, You Win

I get it. The title of today’s discovery seems to be a diametric opposition of itself, but as we dig in you will quickly be able to identify how you can fail and always still win.

First, understand that teamwork truly does, and always will make the dream work.

One of the basic needs as a human is teamwork, and a major survival skill is compromise for the common good. Community is a consistent apparent theme in history as we study civilizations and look to them as an example of this.

We focus on how people socially interact, develop societies and eventually lead to where we are today—more advanced, free and free-thinking than ever before. Still, we operate in the system with our everyday lives where we inherently fit into a role on the “team” that is the community we live, work and play in.

In the book Social: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Connect by Matthew Lieberman—renowned psychologist and professor at UCLA—points to how we are hard wired for social interaction, even diving into education and how we could structure our learning differently for social growth during middle school transition years.

Lieberman points out “that becoming more socially connected is essential to our survival. In a sense, evolution has made bets at each step that the best way to make us more successful is to make us more social.”

So clearly, we have an understanding that teamwork does indeed make the dreamwork by building societies. We rely on the community to be artisans, build roads, be teachers, doctors and lawyers for each other.  

All this known, it is time to begin embracing failure. Failure is your greatest teacher, your greatest asset of growth and the trigger that can always be used to drive innovation further.

Our world relies on failure for growth. You as an individual rely on it. The easiest way to learn not to touch the stove top is to touch the stove top—the quicker you acknowledge that simple principle will be when you truly can begin to grow.

David Goggins told the story recently at a seminar of the man seeing the “what if” of life after death. The “It’s a Wonderful Life” concept but instead of not being around, you just didn’t do what you could when you should to achieve your personal greatness.

That is a heartbreaking, gut punching scenario. Imagine living through the “what if” movie of your life, seeing all you could have accomplished and missed. Now think of all the times you didn’t pull the trigger because of fear of repercussions and failing.  

The fear of failure is a real, paralyzing feeling. Looking like you made a bad decision in front of peers, failing in front of your community is a big enough detractor for most people.

So don’t be most people.

Start prepping for the race, begin creating that business plan, try out for the team or play that you keep putting off. No matter what the result is, you won’t know if you don’t try. In the end, the failure may be the best thing that ever happened.

Look at Thomas Edison, inventor of the incandescent light bulb and holder of 1,093 United States patents. He made his largest life impact on the world based on continued failures that he learned from.

He famously said “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” He lived by four key principles his mother bestowed upon him at an early age—most notably being “Never get discouraged if you fail. Learn from it. Keep trying.”

There are numerous names in history that contributed to electricity and the development of its usage, but Edison was a major player that admitted his failures openly and showed without them there would be no growth—no gain.

You must be willing to step out and take chances, be bold and push for personal achievement. You never know what your true impact is on your sphere of influence—those that are around you daily. Some you know and talk to, others are just people that you have contact with that you may otherwise not recognize being a part of that sphere, but they are.

Be the influence that is a doer, a person that embraces the try. Be an inspiration to those around you and possibly change the world. At the very least it will change yours. You owe it to yourself and everyone around you to try, to fail and grow. To become a better version of you today than yesterday.

What chance are you not taking because of the fear of failure? What success story won’t be written by you because of this inaction?

Tie the laces and get to work, it’s time to live the life meant for you and the community around you.