Failure is something that stomps on our self-confidence and desire to pursue our goals. It has the power to make even the most qualified curl up and retreat, especially as news travels sooo quickly and trolls lay waiting to give uninformed and unwanted opinions. It is a part of life, but you can overcome failure, grow from it, and still achieve your dreams.

A few years back, Disney released an animated movie called Meet the Robinsons that had a deep impact and meaning: celebrate each failure you have because it gives you an opportunity to try again..wiser.

Most people make the mistake of thinking that when they fail at something, they should move on and take it as a sign they were never meant to succeed at it. Wrong, wrong, wrong!

When you’re trying to accomplish something, failure is the best thing that can happen to you. Seriously! Do you think the light bulb was invented the first time around? No! Thomas Edison took thousands of tries to get it just right!

What about the first wheel or the telephone? Of course, it takes multiple tries by multiple people to reach success, but the key point to remember is that you must fail first to know when you’ve succeeded.

Real-Life Examples of Failure

• Think of a toddler learning how to walk. Although they give a fair share of tantrums during the learning stages, they pull themselves up after each fall and try to walk again. Instinctively, they’re teaching themselves how to perfect the movement based on their past mistakes. It’s a trial-and-error process!
• People struggling with weight loss often feel like failures when they gain weight while dieting. Keeping a weight loss journal can help them track their progress and learn to recognize what triggers backslides, including emotional or physical triggers that can be prevented—learning from these mistakes will teach them how to combat those same problems in the future.

Failure offers another benefit: it opens doors that will allow you to find out what you’re really destined to do. This happens in college all the time.

How Your Experiences Help You Find Yourself

Certainly, you know at least one person who went to college to pursue one degree and as they went through their course work, experiencing successes and failures, they discovered a new career interest and changed their major.

Think of a student who started college to become a nurse, but soon realized what they really enjoy is teaching. The whole reason they were going into nursing was to help educate people to improve their lives. Ultimately, they found the best way to do that is not as a nurse, but as a teacher. There’s nothing wrong with that!

As long as you can learn from your “mistakes,” they’re not mistakes at all – they’re opportunities for success! There’s always something to learn from every situation. Once you understand the lesson, it will make you a better person.

Become Stronger and Wiser

Failure makes you a stronger person. Imagine what it would be like if everything you did always went your way. Imagine that you were successful at everything you attempted your whole life and then one day it happened: you failed! You failed so severely that it caused you to lose everything. How would you deal with that failure if you’d never had to overcome an obstacle before?

Failing allows you to become more resilient, so you can always figure out a way to move forward.

The first wheel may have been square, and it moved, but it was wobbly and eventually fell over. But the inventors never gave up! They figured out how to make it rounder so it could roll smoothly. You can do the same in your life! You can’t give up; you have to pick yourself up and figure out a way to roll forward, stronger than ever!

Action Steps To Overcome Failure:

1. Learn from failures. Evaluate missteps and brainstorm alternative ways to achieve your goal.

2. What are your takeaways? What skills were you missing? What new can you learn to improve the outcome?

3. Keep a journal of your progress and remind yourself to never give up on yourself. If not this, God has many other accomplishments ahead for you!

There is so much more ahead for you if you invest in the uncomfortableness of gaining strength by learning how to overcome failure. You can do this and succeed!

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