How To Embrace Failure..

+1 for Dweck's Mindset. I listened to the audio a couple of year's ago. Dweck was in Australia last month and I had the pleasure of attending her seminar on the same.

 

this is very true

 

I never discuss failure, mention failure with my children, just not something I think about..

I always tell them they can achieve anything they want, shoot for the stars.

Just saying......

 

I just read the Seasons of Life. Thanks Leo 2413 for mentioning that .

I have come to realise the more of these types of books l read the worse l feel about my failures !
It just seems to compound my over whelming feeling of
"l have stuffed up "
Fear of making a mistake. I wish l had had more of that and spent just a little more time learning in the beginning. I had a fear of missing out.

I love reading all the great posts on this forum . I turn green with envy of the courage many of you have on your investing journey.
Cheers
Offshore

 

Finished Mindset the other day. I must say it struck me as being remarkably similar to the concepts of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. An interesting enough read but not original - or at least I've heard variations of it before. Still worth reading if you have or teach kids though

 

HI @Offshore,

In many cases its not too late to turn things around, to change course and to start ticking off some of your goals in the medium term. You have to find a way to not let fear cripple you. Having fear is fine but then just put it into context and move on. I agree with you about spending a little bit more time in the beginning learning the basics before jumping in. Maybe if you post more of your situation then members can further give advice.. Often it just takes a nudge in the right direction that starts to change everything.

Cheers

 

It is a good thing for kids to learn that not everything works out, even if you try your best.

Apparently it's a bit of a modern day issue - kids always being told that everything they do is great. From parents, teachers etc.

Then, when they encounter life and the actual experience of failing, they can't deal with it that well.

It is important to understand the negative feelings that can come with failure and learn that we can recover emotionally - and to discover healthy ways to do so ( rather than turning to alcohol or drugs).

 

right

I have experienced the opposite, my children are in their twenties, perhaps different to your children's age group?

This is why I encourage and try to build confidence.

Does not mean there will never be failures, but I prefer to promote positives, and deal with the other if and when it arises, hope this makes sense

 

Failure and success are both imposters in life. Being too hung up on either of them and you'll miss the point.

 

Embracing both sides of life is essential to living an inspired life, so why not embrace (or accept?) both failure and success? Its kind of like expecting there will only be days without nights, its unrealistic. If you expand your awareness and ask yourself quality questions, you will see that even in failure there is success and in success there is failure.

 

Sam walton said, fail, get up and move on.

 

The online Oxford dictionary defines embrace as: 'to take or receive gladly or eagerly; accept willingly'.

Personally I don't know any highly successful people who have this attitude to failure. Like I said, I prefer to put failure into context:

1. Is it normal to fail? Yes.
2. Will we all fail in some way as we achieve more and more? Yes
3. Should we be afraid to assess, reformulate and then try again after failure? No.
4. Should we fear failure? No.
5. Can we use failure to learn from mistakes, change/tweak approaches and then plan to do better? Yes.

But embracing failure?? Not for me.

Just my opinion and approach.

 

Acceptance - that is the key.

When you accept that failure and success is inevitable it keeps you humble and grounded. Expecting to have only success is naive and unrealistic. Thats why if you accept the failure is a part of the journey, then you can smart and manage failure before it knocks you over or sets you back for years & years.... think back up plans, diversification, contingency plans etc .... be smart, not like the idiot writing this post.

 

I was watching John Demartini on you tube the other day, he said when Donald Trump does a project he has a team who thinks of all the possible obstacles, failures, mishaps etc that could pop up and they come up with several contingency plans. Its a very proactive and realistic approach. He accepts failure and even plans for it. Thats smart!

 

Yep, contingency planning is smart.

I don't call that "embracing failure".

 

@Kate Moloney with all due respect, you need to read my post carefully. I have never said that I support the belief in only expecting success and not failure, nor have I said to not be prepared for failure - my position posted is actually quite the contrary to that.

 

Thats awesome, then you have embraced that failure is a part of the journey.

 

Ive got this - but haven't read it yet. I will put it in the priority queue

 

I have to read it... the power of "not yet" also comes in. "I can't do it" turns into "I can't do it..... yet".
Huge mindset shift.

The Power of Yet: Do You Believe You Can Improve? | Sam Thomas Davies

 

There's definitely that in the book

 

I have said over and over again like a broken record for years (and have gotten attacked for it at times) that mindset development and having the right philosophy is pretty much at least 75% the challenge in all this. It will make the difference between a mediocre investor and an outstanding one. If you can't get your mind right then your investing is gonna be affected severely from all angles. I know because I've screwed up many times and its always been the mind that got screwed first before the poor decisions. Anyway I still stick by that opinion re mindset 100%. Haters can continue to hate. Its all part of the game and its quite expected.