Failure … don’t be frightened of it

Don’t be frightened of failure, welcome it like an old friend!

Why? Because only by making mistakes and failing can you get closer to your goal. Remember the old story about Edison, who tried many, many times to find a suitable material for a filament for his new electric bulb. One after another they failed, fizzling out immediately or within a few minutes, or after a few hours, or even weeks. Each one a miserable failure.  But he kept on, and eventually found something that would burn brightly for hundreds, even thousands, of hours. And when someone commented that he’d failed many times on the way to success, his answer was that no, he hadn’t failed, he’d just found 10,000 ways that didn’t work!

Edison knew what every child knows

Remember how a little child stumbles, time and again, when he (or she) is learning to walk? They resolutely refuse to be beaten. They just keep plugging away at it till they can stand and manage to steady themselves, at first, just for a few moments. Then they falteringly move one foot in front of the other, time and again, all the time stumbling and tripping, sometimes falling painfully on their faces, but always just carrying on.

They drag themselves up and try again. No matter how many times they fail. It means nothing to them (at least nothing negative). All it means is they haven’t quite cracked it yet,so they just keep on plugging away. They have this inbuilt drive to succeed that makes them keep going, against all the odds, and they let nothing stand in their way.

The inbuilt drive to succeed

And we’ve still got it, every one of us. Only now, as adults, we’ve more or less given up on it. Often, the very thought of failing is enough to make us quit before we’ve really started. We do try, oh yes, we try … but then, after a few failed attempts, we fold, more often than not. We just can’t face the failure. It’s so hard to face even the possibility of failing that we take the coward’s way out, and just stop trying.

Then we make excuses. The time wasn’t right … the circumstances were against us … it was almost like there was a conspiracy to stop us succeeding, and on and on and on …

It’s almost like the one thing we never fail at is coming up with fresh excuses. We’ve got one ready for every occasion, and another one on a low light, simmering, almost ready for use. We can make excuses till the cows come home. But the sad fact is, even we, ourselves, don’t really believe those excuses. We know, deep down, that there’s an unpalatable truth hiding away in the shadows. And that truth is that we just plain quit.

Excuses shame us

We can dress it up how we like, and we do, but in our solitary moments we know the truth. And the truth doesn’t just sadden us, it shames us. And there’s no more bitter pill to swallow than the truth about how we just gave up when we should have kept right on.

If this rings a bell with you, make a promise to yourself to be bold next time. To keep on when things get tough, no matter how hard it is to keep going. Make a vow that you will not quit, no matter what. Remember Churchill’s words, when he spoke to the assembled boys at his old school, Harrow, when he ended with those famous words, “Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.”

Next time you face failure, remember Churchill … remember Edison … and remember every little boy and girl that boldly and fearlessly kept right on till they eventually learned to walk. And then see if you can still make those excuses you’ve grown used to leaning on.