Standing On The Shoulders Of Failure

Hi and welcome to this week’s He Said, She Said.  This week it’s my pick of a topic, and it’s one that we usually keep to ourselves.  No one likes to talk about failure, and yet it is the one topic that will define your life.  It’s time for another Ladies first edition, so here I go!

She Said...Joanna

Successful Failures

Success is great; it feels great, it can be emotionally rewarding but the learning we can gain from it is often more limited than when we fail. The difference between a failed failure and a successful failure is what we take from those experiences and in how we apply that in the future.  Here are just 2 of my biggest failures and how it changed me, my approach to work and life – I hope you can find some resonance in these and learn from my mistakes.

I’m a ‘The Apprentice’ Reject – not once, but twice.

Way back in 2008 and 2010 I applied for The Apprentice UK. I was looking for a way to kick-start my career, which seemed to have stalled, and I didn’t know how else I might give it a jolt to get it moving again. With the growth of my family, being the principal bread-winner and the economic recession which had hit Belgium I was looking for a quick-fix shortcut to solve all my financial, personal development and career woes.  I got invited for an interview both times. However, that’s as far as it went. I failed; twice.

At the time, was I disappointed? Sure. So how did I turn the situation from a failed failure to a successful failure and end up, ultimately, glad that I was rejected? Because it taught me so much about me that it did kick-start my career again, just not in the way I thought it would.

I learned that I can’t be someone I’m not and I’m not prepared to compromise my integrity to feed my ambition, drive and passion. Recognising meaning and purpose in my work are a necessity for me, not a nice-to-have, was a major revelation which helped me know what I was looking for in my professional life and seek it out when I started job hunting.

I realized I need to be learning and developing all the time to gain a true sense of fulfillment and setbacks are just that, a setback – not the end of my career! I need to set BHAGs (Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals) and review them once in a while to check they are still what I desire but there is no shame in changing your mind about what’s important to you and what you want to set out and achieve in life.

Doors of opportunity are constantly opening and closing on us – awareness of them and conscious, well-considered decisions are what are needed to achieve your goals but to be serious about personal success you do need a game plan in order to take charge of your own destiny.

Pride & Jealousy

I was best friends with this girl at school for a long time and academically we were both strong but we were also competitive. One day, however, I wouldn’t back down in an argument we were having about a maths problem we were given as homework. I was stubborn and thought I was right. And even when she explained why I was wrong in my calculations (which I was) I was so jealous of her ability to solve the puzzle, when I couldn’t, that I still wouldn’t swallow my pride and admit it. It was the beginning of the end of our friendship and to this day this is probably one of my biggest regrets in life.

To be a good friend, or indeed colleague, we should celebrate each other’s successes and be humble enough to accept when they have been successful, even where you may have failed. Don’t let jealousy, pride and stubbornness blind you from the learning you can take from other’s successes – it’s a deadly trio which can destroy relationships.

How to assess your failures to make them successful!

The ability to review your failures in an objective manner is key here. By that I don’t mean you should negate yours or others human emotions and feelings out of the equation completely and focus purely on the factual data. Instead all information (emotional, factual) should be observed from an external perspective. And if you are unable to do that then it’s a little like a joke about a serious situation – maybe it’s just too soon. Too soon and too close to be viewed from afar. Go back to review it a few months later, maybe years later. And indeed, once may not even be enough to glean all the learning you can from the situation.

He Said...Michael

Which Club Are You A Member Of?

You have a lifetime membership in a failure club.  So does everyone else no matter what their skin color, geographic location or size of their bank balance, so you are in good company. Now there are two branches of failure club, and you can’t be a member of both organizations at the same time. Membership dues are identical as your payment is always non-refundable “lifetime” but the clubs themselves are very different.

Failure club one is known as the What Do I Do Next Club?  No makeup or fake blood in this fight club.  The bruises and blood be they mental, physical or spiritual are all real.  They hurt, and you might even take an “eight count” on the canvas, but every member gets up.  He or she might be disoriented, and initial victory might be making it to the end of the day, or week or month or even longer while he or she regains a clear head.  Other members of this club may attend to your cuts, be an ear to listen to you or a partner in prayer.  It all helps, but you hold the rudder in your life so ultimately you will arrive at a destination of your choosing.

My mum died in my arms with me telling her I loved her.  Even the nurse was crying and working at a hospice death was a daily companion for her.  My mum's passing left me feeling very alone and with a hole inside of me.  As I dealt with the usual feeding frenzy that accompanies death, I knew that the lawyer who was handling my mother’s affairs was working in his best interests rather than hers or mine.  As I looked after my mum in death as in life and carried out her wishes, I would receive phone calls and letters which I knew to be wrong and yet could do nothing about it.  I would go for walks in the countryside to think about things, but what I knew to be wrong I had to let pass overhead like a cloud as I didn’t have the strength to pluck them from the sky look them in the eye and deal with the problems.  Eventually, I regained all my “senses” learned the legalese I needed to use to ask for an accounting of services and received a check from the solicitor on the spot.  Sometimes you get up and “find a way” instantly, and sometimes it takes a little time.  Be kind to yourself.

Failure Club Two has a membership of Walking Dead people.  They take failure to be a period rather than a comma in the story of their lives and exist rather than live a full life.  We all don’t fail at the same time and many times people are dealing with failures that dwarf the problems you are facing they just don’t talk about them, instead choosing to focus their energies on dealing with the situation and improving their circumstances.  It is deeply saddening to see a person who accepts defeat as the final beat of their life.  Some dull the last throes of hope with alcohol, food, television or the internet. 

There will come a time where you will receive a knock be it expected or unexpected that will have you paying dues into this club.  Get out as quick as you can.  Do some volunteer work, to get out of your head and maybe learn to look at life from a different perspective.  No black cloud hovers exclusively over you. We’re all in this life together. 

History Lessons

One of the beauties of getting older is you have a personal history of success and failure.  You inherently know that the bad times pass like rain before the sun and that often if you are smart enough to continue to be engaged in life failure was a precursor to future success. If your heart is beating, you are still in the arena.  You still have options.

Don’t kid yourself that your biggest successes or failures will be in business.  They won’t.  If you lose anything financially, the world will always be producing currency, and there will always be opportunities to earn more money.  Your biggest failures will be in your personal life.  Not fulfilling your potential or loving the people in your life with everything you’ve got.  No one is going to know Steve Jobs a hundred years from now, and no one can really know him now as he’s dead.  At best you can form an impression of Mr. Jobs from his interviews and through the various filters and agendas of people who knew him and have written books or articles on the man. We stand on the shoulders of those that have passed before us.  We are passed the baton in the human race, and we either run with it, stand still and hold it or drop it.  No matter what choice you make the next generation after you will get the baton and make it their own.  That is the way the Circle of life dictates time.

Standing On The Shoulders Of Failure

We can’t change the past.  We can only use it to improve the present and prepare an even better foundation for the future.  This rule applies to your personal and professional life.  If you look back with regret, you are wasting time.  You fix past failures by applying lessons learned to the present.  If you didn’t act or say things the way you should have done in the past, do them and say them now.  If you wish you’d treated loved ones differently then acknowledge it and honor them now by loving the people in your life in the present.  Learning and doing things differently are the only ways to put failure into its proper context as a stepping stone in your life.

The Best Thing About the Inaugural Silicon Valley Comic Con

 Michael J Fox is known for being a hard worker, a devoted family man, a nice guy and someone who used to smoke like a chimney.  At Silicon Valley Comic Con in a packed hall, he was greeted with his co-stars for his work in the classic sci-fi Back To The Future movie trilogy.  In the midst of the Q & A a young man with trembling limbs stood up and asked Michael how do you go on?  I can’t eat soup, and trying to take a photograph is a joke.

Mr. Fox, who has faced the challenge of Parkinson's disease for many years, replied.  As you know, Parkinson’s is a progressive degenerative disease, and I was diagnosed in 1991.  As time goes on, I find there are things I can no longer do in the way I used to do them so I just have to find other ways of accomplishing things.  When I wake up in the morning, I look in the mirror and say what are you f*#@ing smiling about but I choose to think positive.  If you think the worst is going to happen and then it does happen, you have lived it twice.  It was the perfect meeting between a member of failure club one and failure club two and I hope the young man on hearing this and seeing how courageous and life-affirming Michael J Fox is will be able to now pay his dues into club one.

A difficult subject this week and I hope Joanna and myself have helped you realize you are not alone in your endeavors. You’re alive, and your life is a testament to the ultimate victory of success over failure in life.  What you do with your power of choice is up to you.  Good luck and we’ll see you next week.

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Photograph References:

"Atlas Recycled" by Tom Tsuchiya is a sculpture made of atlases and maps that serves as a recycling receptacle for bottles and cans.  By Cf6-50 Artwork by Tom Tsuchiya (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Sir Alan Sugar host of The Apprentice UK.  Damien Everett [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Schoolgirls in Japan.  By Jim Epler from San Diego, USA (Flickr) [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Outlaw motorcycle jacket, showing 'colors', Mongols motorcycle jacket, showing colors. See page for author [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

Dempsey vs Firpo.  By George Bellows [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Shane Walsh feeling dead on his feet.  By chrisjortiz (IMG_9311) [CC BY 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Unidentified woman taking her own photograph using a mirror and a box camera, roughly 1900.jpg.  By Unknown (Life time: Unknown).Tsukiakari at en.wikipediaUnknown (Life time: Unknown). The original uploader was Tsukiakari at English Wikipedia. [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons

Back To The Future Logo: By Universal Studios or Drew Strutzan (https://www.movieposterdb.com/poster/2621fab7) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

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