Feeling hurt and sad when you’ve failed to achieve something, regardless of how big or small it may be, is only natural and there’s little point in dwelling on past failures. Nowadays people put too much effort into avoiding failure and this does nothing apart from lead to painful situations.
Today we’ll be discussing 9 of the most useful ways to overcome the pain of failure that’ll help you shift your focus toward moving on with your life.
1. Don’t Feel Threatened By Failure
Have you ever heard the saying, “Once a failure, always a failure?”
Unfortunately, too many people tend to take this literally to the point where they start thinking they’ll never succeed again. Such negative thoughts serve to do nothing but hold you back. Once this mindset takes over, you’ll be crippled by an overwhelming fear of failure that’ll prevent you from reaching your full potential. If you’re to move forward and lead a fulfilling life, you’ve got to overcome such thoughts and replace them with positive ones.
2. There is Nothing Wrong with Feeling Bad
When you fail to achieve your goals, deep feelings of anxiety, sadness, shame, and anger take over – it’s only natural. In fact, you could go as far as saying it’s important to feel hurt after a failure. Rather than forcefully suppressing these feelings and emotions, use them to your advantage. Instead of feeling bad and wallowing in your own self-pity, Use these feelings as your drive to do better and to improve future performance.
3. Develop Healthy Habits to Stay Healthy
If you haven’t already, start a healthy habit. Go for walks, practice breathing exercises, take a bubble bath, meet with family and friends; anything that keeps your mind clear and free from negative thoughts. Draw up a list of healthy habits or activities that you might enjoy, decide on a few that you like and make an effort to practice them on a regular basis. Who knows, one of these healthy habits might even be the secret to your success!
4. Avoid Picking Up Bad Habits
Sometimes, people turn to things like drugs or alcohol in an attempt to dull the pain that they feel. Ultimately, drug and alcohol addiction will just make things worse and do more harm than good. It’s best to avoid picking up such bad habits and instead focus on learning skills that can help you heal in a healthier way.
5. Take Reasonable Responsibility for Your Failure
Pretending that something isn’t true or ignoring the true reason behind why things turned out the way they did is counterproductive and will never make up for what really happened. In the same way that taking too much responsibility can make you feel restless and create unnecessary tension, not taking responsibility for your actions will stop you from learning from your mistakes. Don’t make excuses for your failures. Make an effort to find out exactly why things went the way they did, accept any mistakes you may have made, and focus on learning from them.
6. Study Yourself
Many people feel disheartened after a failure, while many others take failures as an opportunity to learn about and improve themselves. Where do you fit in? What mistakes have you made? What areas are you lacking in? By digging deep and learning about yourself you’re able to turn your failures into valuable life lessons and use the knowledge gained to achieve your goals.
7. Keep Looking Ahead
Don’t get stuck focusing on the things that went wrong. Thinking about the same thing over and over again won’t do you any good. While reflection on past failures is necessary, planning your next move and moving on is even more important.
8. Take Inspiration from Failures that Led to Success
History is filled with stories of men and women who’ve all failed at some point in their lives but went on to become major successes in their respective areas. The one thing these people all had in common was that they didn’t let their failures stop them from experimenting and trying out new things. Learning about these people’s past failures and how they overcame them can be a great source of inspiration for you to overcome your own shortcomings.
9. Learn to Accept Your Failures
Running away from failures or trying to avoid them will never teach you anything. Go beyond your comfort zone, explore new avenues, don’t think about the rejection that you may face and come to terms with the fact that you too can fail. As you move ahead in life, you will come to realize that failure is simply a part of life – the sooner you start treating failures as learning opportunities, the sooner you’ll reach your full potential.
Don’t take failure as a sign of defeat. While it’s impossible to completely avoid and prevent failure, the above steps should hopefully help you manage and mitigate the aftermath. If you’re still struggling with failure and feel like nothing is helping, don’t be afraid to seek professional help. No matter how overwhelmed you might feel, never forget that there are people out there dedicated to help.