Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Victorious Living

Home
Family, Parenting and Religion
What To Do After You Experience Failure

What To Do After You Experience Failure

Last updated on: September 8, 2019 at 11:24 pm by Victorious Living

What To Do After You Experience Failure 2019-09-08T23:24:45-04:00 Victorious Living

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

We try so hard. Our best foot is often placed forward. But our intentions derail. Our risks don’t work out. All of us are imperfect. A life of meaning cannot be lived without some failure along the way. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team. John Grisham couldn’t get a publisher and had to sell books from the trunk of his car.

Most of our lives are structured to avoid failure. What do we do when the house of cards tumbles? What happens when our worst fear comes true and failure finds its way into our lives?

The way we react to failure is vitally important to our character development, the health of our relationships, and the overall success of our projects.

Accept Consequences

Too often, we try to boomerang back from failure as quickly as possible. We try to cover it up, pretend it didn’t happen, excuse it, justify it, and attempt to avoid it again. This usually results in victim mentality, where we blame others and deflect responsibility.

We are so frightened about failing. The only value we often see to failure is avoiding it. But there is more there.

The first step to productive failing is accepting the consequences of failure. Stop running, hiding, and avoiding. If we cannot accept that we fail, we cannot learn from it. And if we cannot learn, we are doomed to repetition.

Learn

Everything in life is an opportunity to learn. When we are experiencing high emotion – such as deep pain or anger – the last thing we want to do is contemplate. We just want it to end.

Failure exists for one very important reason – it is a fabulous teacher. If we do not take the opportunity to learn in the midst of our failure, we have wasted it. We have failed for no reason. Our hurt is meaningless.

When we fail, we are exposed to truth, sometimes harshly. Harsh truth is a teacher not a punisher. It is not looking to knock us down but build us up. We sometimes have to be knocked down in order to awaken our need.

Find the opportunity in failure. Discover what value, purpose or perversion led to the mistake. What can you learn about yourself in the sorrow of disappointment?

Grow

Finally, the essential step is to grow. Change. We have terrible long-term memories. What feels like a short-term catastrophe can be inexplicably repeated later on. We think the high hurt or high emotion of the moment will last forever.

But our patterns are too engrained within us. They are more powerful than our momentary emotions.

Growth does not happen inherently. It happens by intention. In the aftermath of our failure, we have to learn the lesson and commit to the changes necessary.

Failure will always find its way into our lives. There is no avoiding it forever. But how we react to it will determine a lot about the kind of person we will be.

Previous Post

November 16, 2018

5 Factors That Inhibit Growth

Next Post

November 21, 2018 The Transformational Power of Gratitude

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Choices Conflict Resolution Culture Change Emotions Failure Faith Fear Freedom V Growth Healthy Communication Hope Identity Influence Leadership Learn Mistakes Mood Curve Ownership Perspective Power Relationships Self-Awareness Self-Governance Systems Thinking Three Things You Control Transformational Leadership Trust Truth Uncategorized Values Vision

Select a Month January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What city is considered the holiest in Christianity?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Bethlehem Rome Jerusalem Nazareth

Books by This Author Books by Victorious Living

See All Titles »