Never Look at a Failure As Final

A day later than usual, but here is this week's article.

A couple of weeks ago I was asked by a colleague to offer a second opinion on a young professional's advisory report. He had had a conversation with this young professional and told him the report didn't meet the criteria yet. The conversation got heated, some strong words were exchanged, and now my colleague had started to doubt himself.

I read the report, and after the first couple of pages, I agreed. It hadn't yet met the criteria. After consulting with a few people, we decided it was best if I talked to the young professional with someone else. What followed were several weeks of giving feedback and receiving the next version. Now what you don't know yet, is that there was a deadline. This milestone had to be met before March 1st - today. Not passing meant being kicked out of his current program and 9 months of work down the drain.

Friday February 17th, I have just read the newest version and it is still not good enough. I send an email to the young professional giving him feedback and a timeline. The timeline stated, there has to be a report good enough by Tuesday at noon for the end assessment to happen on Friday. This assessment on Friday was the final moment to meet the March 1st deadline. If you are thinking, that is a tight timeline, you would know what I was thinking and feeling when I hit the send button. What followed was silence.

Tuesday morning I see an email in my mailbox sent just before midnight the night before. With trepidation I read the report. Ugh, I have to send a message with bad news. As I am leaving the office, he comes storming in. Very emotional. What followed was 90 minutes of listening, acknowledging, and a final chance.

This failure was not final for him.

Ever experienced something similar to this? I know I have and sometimes I gave up and other times I kept going. How you respond to situations like this, makes a difference.

Do you know anyone who seems to be bulletproof? You know, that friend or colleague of yours that takes failures in stride and is always smiling and moving forward in life. How do they do it? You know they're not immune to setbacks or hardship. They just seem to be able to bounce back quickly. Life's inevitable difficulties don't keep them from living the life they desire.

By the way, that person can be you. Mental resilience is something that can be developed. It's not a character trait you have to be born with. Every time you suffer some type of loss or failure, you have an opportunity to respond with resilience and emotional control.

If that seems impossible for you sometimes, here's what you need to start doing. Never look at a failure as the final result. Don't let some hardship or difficulty be the final chapter in your story. Or, as famous author F. Scott Fitzgerald said ...

"Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat."

This is such a powerful reminder that your outlook is everything. The person with resilience chooses a positive outlook. They understand that negative things are going to happen in their life. Yet they don't allow that to be the end of their journey. They don't embrace any single failure or loss as the final declaration of who they are. What to do?

Just Take One More Step

Resilience means persisting. You keep going. You push forward and see life's difficulties as nothing more than challenges. You can either become stronger and more capable or allow a defeat or failure to be a statement of who you are.

This can seem like simple advice, but the truth is, sometimes, the hardship we encounter in life can be truly debilitating. We simply don't see a way out. The worst of possible things has happened, and there's simply no way that we see any good coming from this.

When this happens, as it inevitably will in life, just take one step forward.

Don't worry about some big end result. You may be in a terrible situation. If you are, just make one positive move.

Have one positive thought. Move in the direction of a positive outcome. Even if it's miles away, don't worry about that end result. Just take the first step that moves you a little bit away from the difficulty you encountered.

Never let any single defeat be your final defeat. The instant you decide to relentlessly push forward, you show the world and yourself that you are a resilient human being. You won't be kept down for long because your unbreakable mental resolve won't allow you to be defined by defeat.

How the story continued...

Oh and the young professional did an amazing job at his assessment and can continue his journey. I received a thank you email form him yesterday expressing how much he valued the support I gave him that dreadful Tuesday evening. It helped him to persist.

Do you perceive failure as final or a launchpad?