Is failure your path to freedom?
“I can’t…”
Can’t is a four-letter word.
“I shouldn’t.”
Who says?
“But what about…”
Eliminate the word “but” from your vocabulary. Replace it with “and.” “What about” has its place during the active planning and execution of an idea – not the avoidance of your dream.
“What will they think of me?”
Do you really care, unless it is showing your children how to be an excellent person? Most people care about what you do when they feel as if they are failing at what they do. Misery loves company.
Are you showing your children how to be an excellent person by what you doing now?
“I hate rejection.”
I do too. I really do. There is just no way to avoid rejection. Rejection is a necessary step toward your success. We all fall as our nervous systems learn how to make us walk. I hate falling, too.
“Someone told me that this is stupid, that I was being selfish and reckless. They said I would fail. they were telling me for my own good, that they wouldn’t tell me if they didn’t care.”
They were telling you that because you once relied on them for wisdom.
Their wisdom never worked. Ever.
They sense that you are right, that you are leaving them behind.
Misery loves company.
Even if you love them, you cannot help them by staying with them in their misery. You can only help them by passing them.
By the way, in this they are right:
You will fail.
Failure is the same as rejection. The only path to success is through failure after failure. Each failure is another bridge crossed toward success.
That is the secret. That is why so few achieve success.
No one wants to fail.
Neither do I. Failing hurts.
Failing only wins if you don’t get back up.
I tell you now: The only way to fail is to never try, or to give up too soon.
I am, as of this writing, fifty. I have been failing all my life. I was once ashamed of that, until I realized that because I relentlessly let myself fail, I am free.
I am disciplined in achieving failure. Because, with every failure, I overcome my fear.
Fear kills the body, kills the mind, deadens the spirit.
Fear is what keeps you silent when you see that things are going terribly wrong.
Dare to fail.
Trust that the universe has you, that falling through the door of failure leads to the path of success.
One of my great mentors, Joseph Campbell, once wrote:
We have not even to risk the adventure alone
for the heroes of all time have gone before us.
The labyrinth is thoroughly known …
we have only to follow the thread of the hero path.
And where we had thought to find an abomination
we shall find a God.
And where we had thought to slay another
we shall slay ourselves.
Where we had thought to travel outwards
we shall come to the center of our own existence.
And where we had thought to be alone
we shall be with all the world.”
Push away that plate of, “IT’S THE SAME THING EVERY DAY.”
Be bold. Go forth and fail with determination. Know that just beyond the bend of failure is everything you ever wanted for yourself and your family.
I gift and grant you loving permission to fail.