Life at Hope College

3 Things I’ve Learned About Failure

1. Take action against failure.

The worst thing you can do to yourself is to start something expecting it to end in failure. A certain awareness of the possibility of failure is needed for everything, but predicting failure as the most likely outcome of anything and everything you do will make everything seem futile. Relax. Think about all the possible ways you could fail and take actions to ensure they will not come to pass. Part of the reasons people fail is because they resign themselves to being spectators of their own lives. Don’t be a spectator; take center stage. If all of life is a stage, then let the show go on!

2. Learn from your failures.

The only thing worse than failing is refusing to learn from failure. Ignoring or outright refusing to acknowledge the reasons you have failed is to set oneself up for even more serious errors and blunders. It is especially important that one learns from failure, especially if one happens to be a college student. The older we get, the higher the stakes in our future become.Tardiness isn’t something that will cost you your livelihood now, but it probably will in a few years when you are working to establish yourself in your chosen career. Take a moment to reflect on your actions (always a good thing to do, regardless of the outcome of your actions). If you discover you don’t like what you see in hindsight, good. You can now take steps to ensure you’ll have no reason to be disappointed or ashamed of yourself they next time you have a moment of introspection.

3. Do not let your failures define who you are as a person.

It is easy to resign oneself to failure, especially if ones efforts are met with unsatisfactory results time and time again. When one finds oneself in such a situation, one only need remind oneself of this; your failure’s do not define who you are; the lessons that you learn from failure speak more about who you are.

Stay safe out there. All will be well.

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