Failures

Ever wondered what makes people successful? (Firstly, let's define success. Success according to me is being able to accomplish your goal and this is what I mean when I use the word henceforth.) The difference between winners and losers is just this one simple fact. Winners never quit, no matter what. They have that grit, the determination and passion that they will reach their goal no matter what. They will fall, they will fail but eventually they will rise just like the phoenix does from its ashes. They are not afraid to take risks and they are definitely not afraid of failure. Life will beat us down to our knees, it does to everybody no matter how strong you are. Everyone that has had an impact on this world and changed it for the better, has been through some kind of adversity/ failure in life.

Don’t be afraid. Just go out and do what has to be done. If Steve Jobs had been afraid that people wouldn’t like his problem, the tech industry would be completely different now. Do you want to be a person who fears failure? Or one that enjoys the taste of success? You cannot rise if you don’t fall. Expecting to succeed at every attempt would be like wanting to score a goal, with every shot that you take. Some will hit the goal post, some will go out, some will be saved by the keeper. So is the case with life, you can’t always succeed, you will fail at something or in some way and that is perfectly ok. It is going to be hard, if it were easy everyone would’ve done it by now and it would’ve been something worthless. A goal is a goal only if it challenges you out of your comfort zone and pushes you to grow as a person. Success is when you accomplish the goal that you set your mind to. If Thomas Edison gave up after a couple of attempts, we might not have had the light bulb now. He once said that “I have not failed; I have just found out 1000 ways that don’t work.”

J.K Rowling’s Harry Potter was rejected by 12 publishers, it is now one of the best-selling books all time. Steve Jobs was thrown out of the company he built only to come back years later as a much better business man. Michael Jordan, one of the greatest basketball players to have ever lives, didn’t make it into his high school basketball team. Walt Disney was fired from his first job because he was termed, ‘not creative’. Albert Einstein, the father of modern physics, never did well in school and was termed as ‘useless’ by his teachers.

What I have come to notice is that this generation can’t handle failure. We have seen many incidents where kids commit suicide because of a so called ‘failure’. They do bad on a test or exam and decide to end their life as they are scared of society and parental pressure. When things don’t go our way a lot of people tend to go into depression, intoxication and self-harm which are just not the answers to anyone’s problems. We all need to understand that one incident doesn’t define who we are, life always offers us a second chance to do better and come out stronger than before. When you fail, be thankful for it because failures give us an opportunity to reflect and see what went wrong and how it could’ve been done better. Failures shape us as individuals and foster massive growth. We learn more about ourselves and what we are capable of when we fail as compared to when we win. The most important thing is to try and learn from our mistakes and ensure to not repeat them again. If that is done, you are going to be better at what you do after your failure as compared to before your failure. In my case, in my 2^nd national kickboxing tournament, I got my shoulder bone dislocated in the 1^st round in a way that shouldn’t have happened. It made me realize that I lack the strength and conditioning that is required at the competing level. That failure helped me get a step closer to becoming a better overall athlete as I now work on strengthening my body parts as well give proper emphasis on warm up.

The next time you fail, remember that it will make you better provided you are willing to learn from it and not give up so easily. The people who are termed as ‘successful’ have been through failures but they overcame it, which is what got them to the level at which they are.

"Failure is never fatal and success is never final" ~ Conor Mcgregor