Thursday, July 18, 2013

Step Five How to Deal with Failure

So, in a recap here are the first four steps for dealing with failure...
 1) Stay Calm.
2) Look for the Learning.
3) Shift into the New Model of Failure.
4) Forget About Other People.

It may sound cliche but the final step, #5 is: Try Again.

Thomas Edison was ruthless in his experimentation famously saying,  “I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.”

The only way to parlay failures into future successes is to follow the first four steps and then to try again!

Monday, July 8, 2013

Step Four for How to Deal With Failure

So far I've covered the first two steps to dealing with failure... And they are: 1) Stay Calm. 2) Look for the Learning. 3) Shift into the New Model of Failure... Step Four is to Forget About Other People.

Imagine if you were the last person on the planet... you know the scenario right? You wake up and literally it's just you or you and your significant other or spouse and everyone else is dead or simply gone. When Richard and I have discussed this scenario (on the off chance that it should happen we like to know we've at least and one conversation about it) we decide that we'd pretty much run amok and do whatever we want.  We were a little sad that there would no one at our favorite restaurants to cook our food.

Now if this happened since no one else is around, their opinions of you and your success or failure really don't matter too much anymore do they? That's the mental place you must get to right now.

A couple years ago I blogged about my favorite rule.  It's from a book called 'Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination' by Helen Fielding; the same writer who did the Bridget Jones series.

Olivia is a great character and I fell in love with a list she calls upon throughout the book called, "Rules for Living." These rules span all facets of a woman's life including the very important Rule #3: Never change a hair cut or color before an important event. (I can personally attest to this rule having broken it myself.) Anywhoo...

Then there is Rule #2. My favorite. It's the one I knew deep down but was reminded of it and I have gone back to this rule over and over and over in my life. Here it is: No one is thinking about you. They're thinking about themselves, just like you.

When it comes to dealing with failure, you must forget about other people. When you do, your suffering, embarrassment, fear will almost disappear entirely allowing you to quickly move to step #5!

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