You Win or You Learn – But How?

Failure is not easy to take. It often brings feelings of inadequacy and self-doubt, especially if we know that we are responsible for the failure. If you ‘ruin’ your diet by having a huge weekend of unhealthy eating, if you miss three workouts in a week, if you lose a race or competition or promotion, if you miss out on a great opportunity; these things threaten to shake our resolve and leave us running back to our old habits or giving up. Failure or personal disruption, however, is one of the most powerful tools of insight into your own character and needs in your life. It is an opportunity to monitor your personal behaviour patterns, reflect deeply on them and then grow in wisdom and strategy to ensure future success. If you do not take the time to look at yourself honestly in times of failure, however, and simply blame circumstance or write it off as a moment of weakness, you lose out on the opportunity to build a greater understanding of who you are and where you can grow in discipline and maturity. If you begin to dig into the causes of self-sabotage (ruining your own opportunities by neglecting discipline or important actions to get you towards your goal) or adverse reactions to the unexpected, you will learn about your own fears and habits. Some of us are simply afraid of success – we can’t picture what it looks like and our comfort zone beckons us to remain where we are. The unknown can be truly frightening. The temptation to blame external circumstances, rather than to look at our actions and reactions and be honest about how we can respond in a way that benefits ourselves and others prevents growth and success, even if it makes us feel temporarily less guilty. Even acknowledging our weaknesses isn’t enough. For the process of reflection to be successful, one has to implement action in response. Write down how you could have responded, what the appropriate action would be and identify an upcoming opportunity in which you can actively practice this new self-knowledge and how you will feel about yourself once you do this. Writing this down creates an element of certainty and accountability that is extremely powerful and will assist you in creating real and positive change in your character. So, when you hear the clichéd “you win or learn”, take it deeper than a simple statement.