International Day of Failure

 

Today is the international day of failure; (yes - a day dedicated to failure - google it, it’s a thing). As my daughter told me that it’s okay to fail at anything today; I wanted to tell her so many things. As a pre teen - she would find my words preachy, so I’m sharing it with you and hoping it will resonate ( though you might find it preachy too). They say don’t fear failure and failure are the stepping stones and all that; but how do you not fear failure? How do you not feel left behind? The first time I failed at something, I attempted suicide (not kidding you); since then - I’ve failed so many times that if I tried the same stunt again; I would probably need to be born as a cat 9 times over. How do you hear that you aren’t good enough? Get bad feedback and soldier on, get passed on for promotion and not treat it as failure? I don’t know. I’m searching for the answers myself - I feel like a failure every time my idea isn’t picked up, every time I get bad feedback, even every time when my presentation is criticised for even grammar, when I set a goal as small as waking up at a time and cannot achieve it; but I can tell you this - it’s failure that fuels me. I don’t like to fail. I don’t take kindly to failure. It isn’t fear; it is irritation and anger that I failed. I allow that to channel my story, I force myself to tell a silent prayer of gratitude that the failure stopped at this, and didn’t extend beyond; and then sit down to perform a post-mortem of everything leading to the failure. I call it a post mortem because I don’t want to ever fail again. I want that to be last ever “f’ing” failure. I don’t know if I learn from it - but I learn enough to know that the only person to blame for it is me - not enough effort, or not enough heart, or didn’t care enough. I force myself to think about this the next time I embark myself on the journey; and yes - embark - I do dust off my metaphorical trousers and wipe the blood from my elbows; force those tears back and stand up. Determined to not fail - to slap failure on its face.

So that to me means the international day of failure - being able to slap failure in its face. All that about “growth” and “ experience” and “it is important to participate” is only for people who fail - I have failed and let me tell you - all these are empty when you fail. 

Wake up everyday wanting to conquer the world. Only then will you conquer the world. Wake up wanting to win and trample failure underneath those giant footsteps of yours.