Cómo aprender de nuestros errores

How to learn from our mistakes

Sometimes you win and sometimes you learn

Image by Ulrike Mai

“I never lose: sometimes you win and other times you learn.”

Nelson Mandela

Learning to fail is a skill like any other, which means it takes practice. Most people are not prepared to face failure, even though we fail 300 times before achieving 1 victory. The difference lies in the concept we have of failure and the way we deal with it.

First of all, feeling hurt or sad for having failed to achieve something, no matter how important or insignificant it is, is natural, but there is little point in dwelling on past mistakes. Nowadays, there are huge efforts to not allow ourselves the luxury of failing, but this attitude only leads to situations of prolonged pain.

It's not easy to have built a family for years and then suddenly a separation or divorce makes it collapse like a house of cards. Or to devote yourself to a job, sacrificing hours, time to rest and time to spend with the family, only to have your contract cancelled at any moment. Or to study for years without being able to obtain the diploma you feel you deserve. It's not fair, right?

Having the will to face failure, accept it and, above all, not stay in denial, blaming others or moving straight to the next project without reflecting sometimes requires more than words and yes, the tactic of talking to yourself as a friend works. Our inner interlocutor allows us to bare our feelings and speak honestly. This is a good first step and know that you are not alone.

Guidelines for dealing with and overcoming failure

You will then find some useful guidelines for overcoming the pain of failure that allow you to take the emphasis off that situation and help you focus on getting back on track and continuing your life,

1. There is nothing wrong with feeling sad or angry and owning up to that feeling. It is not about letting off steam by treating the people around you badly. Instead, if you need to cry, let it out into your pillow so that you release the negative energy instead of repressing it.

2. Failure forces you to stop for a moment to study yourself, review what happened and, yes, take reasonable responsibility for your failure. By studying yourself, you return to your center, to your vocation, to your decisions and your behaviors because a situation of this type opens a door to the interior for us to confront aspects of ourselves that we sometimes do not want to see.

According to the French philosopher Charles Pépin [1] “instead of seeing failure as a moment that we wish to forget as soon as possible, let us learn to consider it as an opportunity to take a break from a life that is too rushed.”
3. Failing is different from being a failure. We must make the difference: the fact that you have given yourself completely to a project and it has not been successful does not mean that it should be blamed on you. It is clear that you feel bad, incapable, useless and more adjectives, however, if we confuse the person with the project that failed we are digging a hole of guilt, of self-contempt instead of taking advantage of the opportunity to analyze and learn from whatever could have failed.
4. Don't feel threatened by failure. Sometimes mistakes can be so painful that we are afraid to start over or even try something new, but remember that it is by making mistakes that we learn and, deep down, it is the experience of life itself. "Once the error appears, it no longer depends on us, the only thing that depends on us is the way we face it" said Nelson Mandela in The Virtues of Failure .
Your desire to excel must be greater than your fear of failure. Often this means living outside your comfort zone. But when you are confronted again with your vocation, your dreams, this can motivate you to take that step into the unknown, but of course, with a realistic plan and clear objectives.
Go through life hoping not to fail, but knowing that you can fail and when faced with failure, don't let it control your life.

5. Be inspired by failures that led to success. All scientists can attest to this: making mistakes is the way to discover the truth. It is through trial and error that many scientists have made their discoveries and learned about the laws of nature.

6. Develop healthy habits to stay healthy. If you haven't already, incorporate a healthy habit into your life: go for a walk, practice breathing exercises, try visiting loved ones. Make a list of healthy activities or habits you'd like to incorporate into your life and start with one.

7. Avoid adopting bad habits. Sometimes, when feeling like failure, some people want to avoid it and decide to turn to alcohol and other substances as a form of retaliation or consolation. But this attitude will only make things worse because the deeper you want to go, keep in mind that you must go through all these steps on the road back to recovery. It is better to focus on learning something new that can help you heal in a healthier way.

8. Focus on the next step (option B), plan your next move. Don't give up. Sometimes you have to start all over again and sometimes you can find a viable solution to what failed. For this, the advice above is there to think things through, whether it's worth trying again or better to invest your effort in another project.

Failure as a test for the heart's desire

Img. Jefty Matricio

Facing failure forces us to look back at the dreams of our hearts and ask ourselves what we really want to do in life. There are failures that motivate us to continue along the same path and those that give us the impulse to change our goal.

There are failures that encourage us to persevere along the same path and those that give us clues and, although sometimes painful, the encouragement to change the path. There are those that do not let us give up, while there are others that, like a frustrated trial, free us from a forced desire or prepare us for new things.

Perseverance or change are the two possible lessons that our failures leave us.

3 techniques to better deal with failure

Image by Tumisu

  • Write to vent. As they say, paper can take anything, and in that sense, you can print your anger, frustration, sadness, as well as your reflections and questions. Expressing yourself in this way can be useful because you can tell the paper what you sometimes don't dare to confess to other people, and in these circumstances it is crucial that you express yourself in some way.

  • Go back to what you know how to do, what you know you do well and what gives you satisfaction . Sometimes it's simple things like cooking, doodling on paper, going out to exercise, writing poems... or something that you feel comfortable doing and don't find difficult to do. This is like a ritual for you and your body to remember that you are not a useless person, nor a fool, nor a failure, and on the contrary, it gives you the courage to either continue or to change your purpose.
  • Give yourself a day off from everything. This is an option to turn off your mind and take the emphasis off the feeling of failure. Seek nature; if you have pets, entertain yourself with them; if you have children or elderly relatives, spend some time with them. Sometimes, the simplicity of their daily life can relieve us and give us the serenity we need to face the situation.

References:

[1] https://des-livres-pour-changer-de-vie.com/les-vertus-de-lechec/

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