3 powerful ways to overcome failure 

Overcoming failure can be a hard thing to handle especially when you put your all into something. How do you move past the feeling of being stuck or when you aren’t motivated? Failure is a hard thing to overcome. Many of us have no idea how to move forward because failure can take a chunk of our heart with it. When I wrote my first book in 2017 and published it, I believed that it would be successful. I had followed a lot of the advice I read.

I spent numerous days and weeks reading articles on anything related to book marketing. But it flopped. Months of working on the book and weeks spent of studying book marketing came to a stall. I had no idea what I did wrong. Maybe, if I had published it years prior this wouldn’t be happening. Time surely wasn’t on my side. Here’s the thing though failure is hard especially when you believe your product will be successful. If we were honest with ourselves there’s a 90% chance that whatever you do won’t be successful.

That might be harsh. But think about it, how many stories of breakout stars, underdogs, rags to riches stories do you hear. The reason why we love these stories because the person overcame failure and obstacles to get to where they wanted. If dreams were easy to accomplish then we all would be successful by simply thinking about it. The rags to riches story would be broadcast on our television every week. And we wouldn’t care because of how many times it happens. Life would be easier. Nothing would be worth a pint of gold. And we all would have want we wanted. But would it feel as if it was worth it? Would we cherish what we have if we could simply wish for something and it happened? Life is meant to be a journey. Overcoming failure is one way that makes life more enjoyable. As we wind down the year, I wanted to write a post on powerful ways to overcome failure.

Acceptance

Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement  – C.S Lewis

To become successful, you need to fail. And you got to do it many times. Why? Because that is how you understand what it takes to do things the right way. I was once told they are many ways to do something, a lot of them are the wrong way. Many of us want to be successful like yesterday. But it doesn’t happen like that. And when it doesn’t, we feel like a cosmic joke. One thing I want you to understand is failure is a part of life.

Another thing I need you to realize is when you don’t accomplish what you want, that’s alright. Accept it. Many of our problems are because we don’t accept what has happened. After my colossal failure, I didn’t want to publish another book. I had to accept I failed, and I got something wrong. If other people were publishing books and they were successful, clearly there was something I did wrong. I had to figure that out, and it wasn’t a straightforward thing to do. One of the powerful ways to overcome failure is acceptance.

You need to accept you have failed to move forward because when you don’t, you’ll always make excuses for why something didn’t happen. It was wrong timing. You didn’t have money, or you didn’t have access to certain resources. These are all-plausible excuses, even so, you can do something at the right time and fail. Success doesn’t follow the same rules many of us do.

Accept you failed and move on from there. That’s the only way you can process things the right way and also grow from your experiences. 

Also Related: How to Accept Yourself, Your Life and Your Reality

Change your thought patterns

When many of us fail, we believe we’re failures and that isn’t the case. Failing is a setback, it doesn’t define who you are. Think about the failures you experienced as a child. The first time you were rejected. The time you failed an exam or a project you were working on. How did you react to it? What did you do after you failed? What was your next move?

Many of us had to push ourselves harder. We studied more. Asked for help and practiced getting better. As children, we are pressured to do more and become better versions of ourselves. As we grow up, we allow our thoughts to take siege of us and we decide not to go forward. This is a big mistake. Because it becomes the defining point for our lives. When you choose to throw in the towel, even if it’s minor, you always do that. A powerful way to overcome failure is to change your thought patterns.

A setback takes nothing from you. We all experience setbacks and that’s a good thing because amid a storm, that’s the only way you can grow. You need to change your thought patterns so you can overcome failure. This is a powerful way to beat failure. 

 Also Related: What’s Holding You Back in Life?

Tell someone

Keeping failure, a secret doesn’t help you. Because it makes it seem as if it’s shameful. Maybe that’s what you believe, that you should be ashamed of your failures. But you shouldn’t. No one should. You failed. So what? How many people have failed at things to become successful? Sylvester Stallone was told he was too ugly to be an actor. Walt Disney was fired because his editor told him he lacked imagination. Albert Einstein failed 99 times. It was on the 100th time he was successful.

Many of us can’t imagine failing that many times and never give up. Yet he did it. When we hear stories of successful people, often they hide the fact these people failed. They make it seem as if on the first try they were victorious yet, that’s not the case. Tell someone so you can not only accept it but move forward as well. 

How will you overcome failure? Comment below.

                                                      Keep Pushing

                                     Vanessa