Turning Failure Into Success

Here’s the deal. Bad stuff happens in life. You don’t always win.

Whether it be in our personal life or in business, we will all fail. Ignoring, whining, or complaining will not help. Believe me, I’ve tried. How we handle failure determines our success.

I think failure provides us the greatest opportunities. This is where we can see what we are made of and really shine.

I know I learn much more from my failures than my successes. I believe this is true for everyone. Why?

Failure hurts
Failure is personal
Failure is real
Failure is disappointing
Failure makes us want to be better

When we succeed we have a tendency to take our success for granted. We often don’t analyze why we succeeded because we think we have success figured out.

Failure doesn’t allow that opportunity.

When I fail in business or any other area of my life, it makes me look at why I failed square in the face. I don’t know about you, but the feeling of failure is not the best feeling. Since I already stated that wallowing in your own pity isn’t a solution, let me provide a few alternatives.

Three ways to turn failure into success.

1) Face your failure.

Don’t run or hide because you can’t. Man up to (or woman up to it) your failure and accept it. It’s ok. Own it and pick your head up. Everyone fails. Blaming others doesn’t work. You are responsible for you.

2) Analyze it.

I didn’t say dwell, I said analyze. Examine the whole process to see what went wrong. What could you have done differently? How could you have presented yourself better? Maybe it was a bad decision from the start. Whatever it is that caused the failure, dig deep and get to the root of the problem.

3) Learn and grow.

This is where the success starts. Failure only lasts as long you let it. Once you have faced and analyzed your failure, it’s time to put that information to use. Use this information as an instruction manual for success. The bad and good news is that the instructional manual gets larger as we continue to fail and learn more.

The bottom line

Failure is inevitable. I have failed countless times and will continue to do so. That’s ok because failure provides our largest learning curve.