Some recent weekend in May I failed perfectly. I jumped in for a cancelled event at a space I had facilitated workshops before, and organised a pop-up coaching offer. Though it was short notice I did some marketing, shared in my network and told my friends about it. In the end, nobody showed up. Here’s why I regard this ‘fail’ as useful.
A few months ago, I would have been devastated. I would have jumped to conclusions, seen this failure as evidence for my incompetence and told myself I would never succeed in anything related to my coaching practice. But this day I was zen as rarely before. Three insights that I’ve come to see more clearly over the past months, contributed to my peace of mind:
- It is not about me (if anything, it is about what I do)
- There are circumstances, always
- Everything is a part of a process, which means trying is progress, not failure
I’ll talk about the third one in more detail.
Even though we have things we want to do or achieve in life we are always on a journey. There is always a process, and failure is a part of that. The learnings of one experience might come in handy for another project. So we might wrap up one thing – a job, a relationship, a collaboration – while our process never stops.
Realising this was a huge relief to me. Because it also meant that setting concrete goals became less of a biggy. Where I would previously freeze at the sight of my intended outcome, whether a financial target or putting up a website, I now saw that this particular goal was also just one part of the journey. Meaning that the steps to take were even smaller increments towards completion. And – important – failure just became information about where I am in that process.
Andrew Simonet says that a negative outcome is just as important as a positive one because it means that the process is working. When a creative or scientific project fails, you know more than before. “When you are working beyond what is known, when you are questioning assumptions that haven’t been questioned, you generate a lot of useful failure” – Making Your Life as An Artist.
I wonder whether we might say the same for life in general? My first thought is that we can’t because failure often causes pain. But when I think about it; is it useful when we fail at a career we thought was perfect for us? Does the end of a relationship we saw as the one provide us with helpful information? I think so. It provides information we can then use to take the next step on our journey. Trial and error seems to happen anyway, no matter how hard we try to avoid failing and speed towards succes. Add to that a whole lot of chance and luck, which is not in our hands anyway, and here’s life’s formula.
Things might have looked different on that afternoon in May had the weather been better, had I been more skilled at creating Instagram videos, or had I invested in building a more engaged network. These are all ‘if’s’ I can take into account. Some I can learn from and perhaps take action on right now, later or never. Others are outside of my control and subject to context (who else is there), environment (weather) or timing (what else was on my plate that week).
When we loosen up our emotional attachment to failure, our sight will clear up. We see events such as failure or success for what they are: information. This doesn’t mean that we don’t feel anything at the sight of it. We might still experience disappointment or frustration, but those emotions don’t lead us to action – our gathered information does. The feeling will pass, but the insights remain.
Recommended reading:
Just a Thought – Amy Johnson
Making Your Life as an Artist – Andrew Simonet
Mindset – Carol S. Dweck
Why not, trust yourself?