Hear me out! While I realize that in some ways it does exist, those ways are mostly in our heads. We have each, individually, decided what failure is to us and so when we meet those predisposed ideas of "failure," we feel like, well, failures! In truth, I fail at something every day. The trick is not letting the brain tell us that that means we are not successful at something! Just because you were not successful at something, does not mean that you are a failure!
One more time:
Just because you were not successful at something, does not mean that you are a failure!
I love this quote:
Be brave! Try something and be ok with failing at it! Be brave enough to suck! Then get up and do it again. And again. We aren't learning if we aren't failing! If we get it right on the first try, we have nothing to learn and nowhere to grow! Failure doesn't exist in the form that we all think of it. We might think of failure as the end. But it's not! It is our jumping off point! It is where we start learning and growing! It is our opportunity to say, how can I do this better? What can I learn? Who can I ask for help? Why didn't that work out?
Did the Gabby Douglas get a double back tuck on her first try? Nope. Did Michael Jordan pick up a basketball and instantly become the greatest basketball player. Not at all. He had a series of failures first.
I think we can all agree that Einstein is one of the world's biggest success stories ever. So these quotes from him regarding failure are pretty profound.
And then there is this:
We cannot fail unless we give up!!!!
You are not a failure.
Don't give up!*
Keep going!
You are just getting started!
*an addendum to this is know when something is hurting you or not serving you in a positive or effective way for growth and then the real growth is walking away from that thing. That, my friend, is claiming your power, not failure! In this case, giving up is taking control of your life and that is something that I can get behind!