How To Handle Failures?
How failures hit us depends on how we prepare. Did we try our best or give our best?
This is not going to be a generic pep talk on handling failures.
I will not waste your time by writing some shallow statements like “failures are a part of the process”. They never were. Failures and success are the results at the end of the process. There is no in-between; there is no grey area. It is zero or one, crystal clear.
However, you can try again, and that’s ok, but you don’t have to come up with weak narratives to face your failures.
How to handle failures, then? The solution depends on the path you have chosen. You may not know the result, but you are well aware of the course you have taken, the intensity of your action, and your efforts in the process.
There are only two possible scenarios, and most of the time, we are always well aware of these scenarios.
The first scenario is that you tried your best during your process, but the scope was vast. You drained your whole energy, but still, it was not easy to fathom. You executed the action, but you knew that there was scope for more, a little more you could have done. Let’s call this scenario — I tried my best.
The second scenario is that you are well aware of what it takes for this goal; you are a pro at this, you have gone through this multiple times, and in the past, you may have succeeded at a similar event. You know what you will expect, and you are confident about how to knock them down. You are aware of the certainties and uncertainties of the process. Let’s call this scenario — I did my best.
Out of these two scenarios, in which one do you think failures hurt the people most?
It is the first one — I tried my best.
How to handle failure when you have tried your best?
This is what happens to most of us. We can only try so far.
We usually have high goals that we want to achieve; they’re called goals for a reason! We are well aware of the complexities and intricacies involved in the process. Still, it is human to try and give our best effort, which is one of the most remarkable skills we have developed.
But, most of the time, our efforts will not be enough, which is a hard truth that we have to swallow.
We can only prepare and try to master as much as possible, enough so that our efforts coupled with the right magic of luck will take us towards the victory line.
With life happening in parallel, only so much can be done towards our ambitious goals.
In this scenario, the failure was always lurking at the corners; not expecting it would be delusional.
When failures happen in this case, some people lose hope. They are not able to muster the courage to try again. They are already tired from their enormous effort (which sadly was not enough) and shield their hurt heart from the facade of the “did my best” scenario, which is unfortunately not the case.
How to handle failures, then? Well, you always knew what you left out in your first take. You can analyse the failure and discover the weakness even in those areas you thought you mastered. Try to cover these areas unless you reach the “did my best” scenario in your next attempt.
Eliminate what did not work and assimilate what could work.
What about the did my best scenario?
People who do their best are the masters of their form. They know the magnitude of their goal and have prepared for that, but they are also aware of the process's non-determinism.
Even for them, failure and success are of equal probability. Failures hit them, too, but it does not break them.
Because when you do your best towards a goal or an ambition, you transform as a person. Your success or failure is not limited to one specific goal you want to hit. You are out in the world in your best form.
For instance, a well-prepared software engineer looking to change career will not flinch if he cannot crack one of the top sought companies in Silicon Valley because he knows that he has an equal probability of cracking the next one.
Similarly, how do you think an established author will react if Forbes rejects his submission? They will shrug it off because they have an equal chance of getting accepted at the Wall Street Journal.
They have no control over these failures, which affects them the least.
Through my humble experience in life, I have seen people confident in their art and their form taking failures head-on and succeeding in life.
When we see these people achieving more extraordinary things in life, it is pretty natural to assume that since they were excellent in their business, they got what they wanted. But we never know if this was their first preference or the second. However, they were inevitably skilled enough to crack any of their top choices.
We don’t own the results; we only own the course we take towards our goals. The more prepared we are during the process, the fewer failures will affect us because then we will not be limited by one singular event.
