The psychologytoday.com website described the consequences of failure. Going through setbacks hurts our self-esteem. But there is some good news: failure number 1 does not automatically lead to failure number 2. The first failure may be just what we need in order to draw closer to a subsequent lasting success.
What really makes the difference is personal style when dealing with your own emotional response to failure.
That lousy feeling is necessary
After you fail, you are going to feel bad. That is inevitable. But it is precisely this negative emotion that drives us on to improve our performance in the future. So experiencing negative emotions is an important part of the feedback process.
At the same time it is also true that anxiety does not always work in our favour; therefore, you must know how to avoid falling into crippling negativity.
Have you let yourself down?
The following steps can help turn failure into fuel.
- Recognise and admit failure: We sometimes deceive ourselves into thinking that in fact there was no failure. You need to accept personal responsibility and not just blame your situation. Anyone can make a mistake.
- Stop thinking for a moment: You should avoid rationalising your failure. That would prevent you learning something from it. Instead, embrace the emotions you feel. This will lead you to the next step.
- Start feeling: Engage with your emotions in an adaptive way. Take a non-judgmental stance and label your emotions. Don’t see them as inherently bad or good.
- Prepare for action: Emotions are there to prepare us for action. To overcome failure, try to get out of a low energy state (if you are fatigued, tired and depressed) and focus more on high energy emotions. Be defiant, not beaten.
-jk-