Playing it safe isn’t what makes life fulfilling. Often, it’s taking a risk that truly enriches the soul and allows you to grow and discover your strengths.
We take risks in order to become better people. But sometimes those risks fail, and often that failure can be devastating. When you get rejected, or you’re simply unable to succeed the way you hoped, the natural reaction is to feel defeated, hurt, and broken. Yet it doesn’t have to be that way.
Brokenness is a State of Mind
“It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all, in which case you failed by default.” ~J.K. Rowling.
It’s easy to feel broken after rejection. But the truth is that in order to be rejected, you have to have succeeded, because you did something few others do – you tried.
We have a tendency to create very high expectations for ourselves and what we can accomplish, so failure can hit hard, because we have a tendency to take it personally – by failing, we feel like it reflects negatively on us. But consider this:
- No One Judges – You have friends that have failed multiple times, and probably told you all about it. Did you lose respect for them?
- Time Forgets – Time forgives and forgets. We see it all the time with athletes, celebrities, politicians, entrepreneurs, and more. You don’t hate George Clooney in “Up in the Air” or “Gravity” simply because he was the least popular Batman. You enjoy his successes, and forget his mistakes.
- It Takes Successes to Fail (Yet We Ignore Those) – Imagine you are the hottest popstar in the world, and you’ve been asked to sing the national anthem at the Super Bowl. You get up there on stage and… forget all the words. It’s embarrassing. You “failed.” But yet to get there, you had to learn to sing, get noticed, grow a presence, have someone want you to sing in front of a large audience, and walk up on stage under tremendous pressure. 5 different successes, all because of you.
Feeling defeated is a choice. You can let it hurt your ability to move forward, or you can harness it as motivation, learn from it, and try again.
You Were Once Never Affected By Failure
“Our best successes come after our greatest disappointments.” ~Henry Ward Beecher
When you were about 1 year old, you tried to walk. You pulled yourself up and took a step, and fell flat on your diaper. Then you tried again. This time you fell on your face. But you didn’t let it stop you – you tried again and again until finally you were able to take a few steps, then walk, then run.
Failure and defeat don’t have to break you. They should motivate you. If you find yourself failing:
- Write Out Your Successes – You’ve succeeded in so many ways just to reach that point. Remind yourself what it took to get there.
- Write Out Your Plan – Failure is usually a few steps away from success. What are those steps? How are you going to take what you learned and try to grow from it?
- Keep Going Anyway – Sure, you may have failed (maybe). But you only have one life to live. If this is a goal that you want to achieve, then why not keep going? What’s stopping you from trying your best until you literally can’t anymore?
Don’t let rejection get you down. Instead, let failure guide you, grow you, and motivate you. Whether it takes place in your personal life or professional life, your choice to be broken by defeat is your choice. You can let it stop you, or you can let it push you towards achieving all of your goals.
If you’re looking for a life coach in Bergen and Hudson counties in New Jersey to support and guide you through life’s challenges and create the life you want, please contact me via email using the contact form.
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