Failure is an interesting concept to me because it changes depending on the perspective. If we make an attempt for a goal in life, but we don’t achieve our goal, we tend to say that we “failed.” If it is a constant and continuing process of failing we tend to say that some is a “failure.” But why is this the case?
Important Definitions
The definition of fail is to be unsuccessful in achieving one’s goal. By this definition, if we make the attempt to achieve anything and do not succeed, we have failed. That doesn’t mean that we won’t learn anything along the way, but we have failed. It’s not fun to fail and lose out on achieving our goals. Failing to reach our goals is part of life. We set goals and strive to achieve them and occasionally roadblocks stop us. It is demoralizing and crushing to our morale when we fall short. This usually results in losing the prize at the end of hard work. There are times when we set a goal that is a stretch for our abilities but making goals that are difficult is what pushes us to try our best.
The definition of failure is lack of success. It is possible for us to fail to achieve our goals, but we are not a failure by this definition. Failure would be if we arrived for our goal, failed, but did not come away with anything from the experience. Failure is a lack of learning and success in any way.
Repetitive Failed Goals
I, like most people, sets goals for myself and strive to achieve them. To be honest, I fail quite regularly. I have been working on remodeling part of my basement now for over a year and have failed nearly every milestone that I set in the beginning. I originally wanted to complete the project by Christmas of 2019 and it looks like it will not be completed by Christmas 2020. It is hard to push ourselves when we are not motivated or the reward doesn’t seem to outweigh the input of work. My basement is a great reward and there has been a lot of work input to reach where I am today. I hope to complete the project by the end of the year, but it will take more determination and effort than I have invested recently.
Looking back at my progress I can see that even though I have failed nearly all of my goals, I have come a long way. The space is painted, flooring installed, electrical run, and it’s almost complete. This has still happened with a long list of failed goals. So with all these failed goals, should I consider myself a failure?
Failing ≠ Failure
It’s easier for me to see my progress with something tangible like my basement. I can walk down my stairs and look at the ceiling, walls, and floor and easily depict whether or not a task has been completed, and a goal met. It may be harder to tell when looking at our lives. Not everything that we set a goal to complete is as simple as my basement project. Not all goals we set in our lives have obvious milestones leading up to the primary goal.
Medical students take a Step 1 exam around the end of their second year across the nation. Some of them take it earlier or later, but this seems to be the norm. This is a huge test (if you know a medical student ask them about it) and failing is not an option. Failure is possible and a small percentage of students that fail every year seem to be cast into a different class of students. That failed exam is carved into their permanent academic record. They can retake the exam but the previous failure will always show. I don’t know anyone that has failed but I think this is due to knowing some really good students. From my perspective it seems that most of the students are scared or terrified that they will fail, and use it as motivation to study harder and push for their goal of passing. Students that fail on their first attempt can retake it and become doctors. Failing creates a different path for them, but it is possible. It’s probably best to avoid it but many ask themselves “What if I fail?”
It’s hard to put a positive spin on a failed Step 1 exam due to the repercussions in the students life. Here are some questions that I think we can ask ourselves when we fail our goals.
- Is this failed attempt going to ruin my life?
- Is there anything positive that has come from this attempt?
- Did I achieve anything along the way?
The most important questions are below.
- Did I try my best?
- What did I learn from this failed attempt?
- Is this goal worth trying for again?
The first three questions help to gain some perspective of the situation. I think that in every failure that we experience, there is something positive. It isn’t easy to see positive points after a failed attempt. We may not be able to look back and find it right away, but I believe that it exists. The second three questions are the more important questions in my opinion. The separation between a failed attempt and failure is being able to look at how hard we worked, what we can learn, and if it’s worth pursuing again.
Avoiding Failure
For me the defining line between failing and being a failure is what we learn and how we take our next steps. If we strive to achieve and goals and succeed, then well done. In the event that we fail to achieve our goal but do not learn anything, that is failure.
If failure is defined as a lack of success then as long as we have some sort of success, failure does not occur. I believe that we can always learn from times that we fail. We may learn more about ourselves on how we should/could have handled the situation when compared to success. Maybe we learn that the goal isn’t worth the effort because we don’t enjoy the road to success (or the prize) as much as we thought we would. Maybe we realize where we caused our downfall and can prepare for the next attempt.
The key to avoiding failure is to do our best, learn, and find a way to achieve our goals. There are goals in life that are not achievable. Our mind and body have limits but I don’t think that we usually push ourselves far enough to find them. There is a point where we will be limited and won’t achieve a goal.
It’s hard to tell when the challenge is too much or we didn’t try hard enough. We tend to be limited by our will power and the desire to press on toward our goal. Keeping devoted to a task is hard, especially if the road to the finish line is rough.
Final Thought
I think that people are not failures or achieve failure unless they do not look at what happened and learn from it. Taking the time to look at the situation and think about what happened makes a huge difference in the success when someone tries again. We need to learn from our (and others) past mistakes so that we can be more success on our endeavors of the future. Keep pushing for your goals, learn along the way, and do your best.
If we fail to achieve our goal while learning nothing, we have achieved failure.