Failure is my Friend and Success is a Byproduct

Several years back when I was in middle school, I participated in a speech competition. It was around India's Independence Day,  and I had chosen to talk about India's freedom struggle. I prepared for the speech with my mother's help and was ready to deliver! When the time came, I got up, went to the podium, looked at the people and froze! I managed to talk but continued to freeze! I even had the handout with me, and no one would have known if I viewed my notes and there was not any rule that I should not look at handouts. Still, the written notes appeared completely blank for me, and I didn't finish my speech. There was a good amount of preparation, but I did not plan enough for the delivery. I failed miserably! My mother said, "You will not fail if you have learned from this failure!" 

This message resonated with me so much that I always made it a habit to engage in an appreciative enquiry anytime I failed. I didn't want to waste the failure as I have spent time and efforts in avoiding it and yet have faced it. If I don't want to fail, I need to learn the lessons it taught and incorporate these lessons to avoid failing again. In my humble opinion, this is "Fail Forward!" and I had collected a list of famous failures to remind me how these people turned failure into success by believing in themselves and applying lessons learned!

When I heard about a few friends in my training and mentoring engagements mentioned fearing failure, I mentioned that fear is a normal response. But yielding to fear is giving up growth! Fear of failure should not take over our responsibility to be successful.   

1. Beethoven's music teacher said that he is hopeless as a composer.
2. Edison's teacher told him he was unable to learn.
3. Einstein couldn't speak until the age of 4 and he couldn't read until age 7.
4. Isaac Newton's work in elementary school was rather poor. 
5. Martin Luther King received a "C" in his public speaking class.
6. Louisa May Alcott was told by an editor that her writing would never appeal to the public.
7. Louis Pasteur received a "mediocre" rating in chemistry.
8. Admiral Byrd was deemed 'unfit for service' before he flew over both poles.
9. Caruso's music teacher told him that he had no "voice at all."
10. Henry Ford was evaluated as "showing no promise."
11. Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper because he lacked imagination and had "no good ideas."
12. Abraham Lincoln failed campaigning seven times before becoming the President of the United States.
13. Bill Gates' first business, "Traf-O-Data" was a failure.
14. Michael Jordan was removed from his high school basketball team for "lack of skills."
15. Steve Jobs was removed from the company he started.
16. David Sanders failed selling his chickens to more than 1,000 restaurants before he started KFC.
17. J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter novel was rejected by 12 publishing houses.
18. Oprah Winfrey was fired from her news anchor job & failed in her first attempts at OWN magazine.
19. Sylvester Stallone was rejected acting jobs as he talked and walked funny and couldn't act.
20. Charlie Chaplin was rejected by Hollywood for film acting.

When we see these people, we only see their success wrapped in bowties! Not their struggles, challenges, and failures! They never let their failure replace their responsibility for success! I am sure this list is endless with thousands of people from various countries and professions missing. Success is made up of very little perspiration but a lot of inspiration! As the old saying, "If the map and terrain do not match, trust the terrain" goes, if the world does not believe in you but you believe in a cause, then, every failure is an increment towards your future! Your discipline in continuously learning and growing is the connecting bridge between success and failure. As Maxwell (2012) says, "Habit is the daily battleground for character" and we need to make a habit of learning from failure instead of fearing failure. 

I feel failure is my friend. If that is not the case, I would not have landed in the United States with $16 in my hand and still no place to go to and no one to talk to! I may not be as famous as one of the 20 people I listed above but it is my failures that shaped me to get the most prestigious PMI Eric Jenett Project Management award of excellence in 2017. I am one more testimonial to the long list of so many unknows doing whatever it takes to show the world, "If I can do it, anybody can do it!" As Yoda says in Star Wars, "The greatest teacher, failure is!" It gives me numerous advice. If I listen and learn, success is the byproduct of that fun learning experience. The more we spread that fun experience, the more the fun (success) grows! So, don't fear failure! Embrace it! Failure is final only when you stop!

Thoughts?