Can Failure Really be Success in Disguise?

Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash

Here is something that I have often been challenged with. That is, the idea that failing is part of success. My perfectionist brain wants to tell me that if I am to be a success in this world I must be a success all the time. It also tells me that failure is somehow a setback of some kind. It also tells me that I have a limited number of times that I can fail before I will give up on myself. And, maybe the worst thing of all is that my brain will tell me that I should not have tried in the first place if I was to fail in the end.

I am not alone in this thinking. I am absolutely not alone. There are so many people just like me that think that we need to do things right the first time. There are so many that think that we need to create a plan for success that will indeed have no failures at all in that process.

What I can tell you is that this thinking is faulty. It’s just not correct. First of all, nobody else is expecting perfection from you or me. Anybody who has been around on the planet for at least a couple minutes knows that failure is a part of life. Even the baby who tries to take their first steps knows about failure. The first couple of tries usually don’t work out so well. Any athlete will tell you that the first time they tried to do their sport it also didn’t go so well. And, musicians will be able to describe how incredibly…