The Holiday's are all about traditions. For my family, it's waking up early to go to mass, baking multiple pans of cinnamon rolls, and getting into heated arguments over board games. The last Christmas we had in Oregon was no exception.
We pull into Grandma's driveway around 11am and shuffle inside out of the rain, all of us low on sleep, but high on Christmas cheer. Our Christmas group has slowly expanded the past few years to include a few friends, my wife Joenelle, and now my little brother's fiancé, Lily.
Those with breakfast responsibilities start cooking and the rest of us pull out our favorite board game, Sequence. We're playing the team version and it's Joenelle and I versus Zach and Lily. The only thing riskier than playing board games on Christmas is playing team board games with your spouses against your siblings.
Joenelle and I win the first game and Zach frowns, but quickly offers best two out of three. We get lucky and win the second game in short order. Zach, clenches his fists a little and says, "One more." We oblige and win again.
At this point Zach is visibly frustrated. Joenelle offers to switch the teams up or play a different game, but all Zach offers in reply is the word, "Again."
Again, Joenelle and I win. Zach exhales loudly and can only reply with, "Again." Whether it's sheer luck or God trying to teach Zach a lesson, we win an astonishing 13 games in a row. After each game, Zach becomes more and more frustrated and as he does, starts making more and more blunders in the game. Instead of getting better from game to game, he gets worse.
I'd be remiss not to mention that I have been in Zach's shoes before and as a competitive family, it always hurts worse losing to your siblings. However, being on the winning side that day provided me enough mental clarity to think that there had to be a better way to lose. It turns out, there is.
Failure, be it at a board game or in a business endeavor, is one of the most valuable tools at our disposal. If we agree that failure in life is inevitable, we should be sure that we are taking advantage of the lessons and opportunities that can arise through the experience of failure.
Amy Edmondson, author of Right Kind of Wrong: The Science of Failing Well, suggests that we should consider the context of our failure before we act and learn to fail intelligently.
Are you in a safe environment to fail? Is the goal you're pursuing worth the emotional impact that accompanies the failure you're experiencing? Have you done your homework or just shooting in the dark and hoping to succeed?
We know that the world's most successful people are also some of the world's most notorious failures. We also know that before they say, "again," and take another loss on the chin, they set themselves up to do so intelligently so as to learn from the failure and create future opportunities for success.
How we fail can be a major determinant in how we succeed in the future. Fail well.
Fact
According to several studies, around 30% of people are considered to have a significant fear of failure, with many surveys indicating this fear is even more prevalent than the fear of spiders or being alone at home.
Action
Process your last failure. What can you learn from it?
Question
What is your first reaction when you lose or fail?
Quote
“Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.” - Winston Churchill
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