5 Instructive Reasons That Spotlight Why People Fail
Conquer fear and agony through awareness coupled with understanding.
In 1846, Elizabeth Blackwell decided to go to medical school. She got advice from some family friends who were doctors. They told her to forget about it because women could not become physicians at that time in the United States.
She got a job, worked hard and saved enough money so that she could apply for medical school.
Elizabeth Blackwell applied to 29 different medical schools and received rejection letters from all of the schools that she sent an application to.
Blackwell’s next move was to visit every school in person that denied her acceptance and try to convince the decision-makers to change their minds with face to face meetings.
On many occasions, she was told not just to dress like a man, but pretend to be a man so that she could obtain admittance into medical school.
She refused to be deceitful and pretend to be someone else.
Successful people will tell you candidly that failure is an inescapable part of doing anything worthwhile.
Whenever you are trying something new, learning something for the first time, taking a chance, or stepping out of your comfort zone, you are risking failure.
At the moment that failure happens, it does not mean your circumstance is hopeless. What you are trying to accomplish at that particular time is in the short term, not working for you.
Failure is not a permanent situation. It passes away once you decide to stay flexible with your plan, let go of what did not work in the past and move forward into the future with a modified strategy.
With that in mind, here are five reasons why people fail.
Insufficient Persistence
“The majority of men meet with failure because of there lack of persistence in creating new plans to take the place of those which fail.” — Napoleon Hill
One of the most crucial reasons people ultimately fail is that they give up on achieving their goal too soon.
As Napoleon Hill explained it:
- Persistence is the sustained effort necessary to induce faith.
- Persistence is an essential factor in the procedure of transmuting desire into its monetary equivalent.
- The majority of people are ready to throw their aims and purposes overboard and give up, at the first sign of opposition or misfortune.
- The basis of persistence is the power of will.
Giving up early in the attempt is at the heart of failure. Not that the goal couldn’t be achieved or that it was to difficult.
It is simply because people stop trying too early in the process.
Shortage Of Confidence
“Second guessing yourself means you lack confidence. Lacking confidence means you have no faith and no faith equals failure. No time for that.” — Mama Zara
Confidence is the powerful and unpretentious knowing that you can do something. It is trust in your ability to do a certain task.
When a person lacks confidence, deep down in their heart they don’t feel they deserve to be successful. They believe that they will not achieve their personal goals.
If you don’t believe in yourself, you will not take action. This manifests itself in negative ways such as procrastination, perfectionism, self-sabotage, or constant feelings of anxiety, isolation, and rejection.
The less action you take, the fewer opportunities you will create for yourself. When you reduce your number of possibilities, the less likely it is that success flows in your direction.
Success keeps it distance from people that don’t take action.
We Rationalize Our Mistakes
“The more I thought about human nature, the more I saw how our tragic inclination for sin/mistakes causes us to use our minds to rationalize our actions.” — Martin Luther King
Sometimes people twist reality so that it looks like they didn’t make a mistake at all. When we don’t want to feel bad, our inclination is to look for ways to dodge the truth.
In the back of our minds, we say to ourselves, “I didn’t mess up, that is just the way the world works.” To protect our ego, we start to search for any possible reason that doesn’t incriminate us.
It is not easy to own up to our own actions, especially when they make us look silly to others, but you can’t learn and move forward from this type of failure until you admit it to yourself.
This is one of the biggest obstacles you can have and one of the most important to overcome.
Assuming The Outcome Will Be Different Next Time
“Everything in life is a reflection of a choice you have made. If you want a different result, make a different choice.” — -Anonymous
Sometimes we assure ourselves that certain outcomes are the result of outside factors. We start to believe that there are other elements in the formula that we have no control over and one of these days those elements will appear magically at just the right time.
As long as we keep doing the same thing, the universe will bring everything into focus and we will receive our big reward.
There is no guarantee that things will change because you think they will. Engaging in the same activity endlessly with no meaningful changes will not produce a different payoff.
It is similar to a high school algebra equation where you are the variable. If you don’t change what you are doing, you will always get the same answer.
Lack of Self-Discipline
“Self-discipline is the key to many doors. Not the least of which is the one that leads to a better, stronger and healthier version of yourself.” — -Zero Dean
Self-discipline is a standard of behavior where you choose to do what you know you should do, rather than what you want to do. It is the assertion of willpower over more basic desires and is interchangeable with self-control.
It includes having the personal dynamism to get started and the stamina to carry on in the face of difficult obstacles.
When you are firmly grounded in self-discipline, it gives you the strength to endure hardships whether they are physical, mental or emotional.
There is a large downside in neglecting to have self-discipline. Achieving the goals that you have set for yourself becomes more challenging.
Because of this, you will not feel good about the direction your life is taking and how you feel inwardly about your own spirit. Consequently, you will begin to lose the trust of people who are dependent upon your actions.
Self-discipline is about proactively training yourself to systematically adapt your behavior to the changing circumstances and environment of your life.
Making the decision to be a self-disciplined person can have a powerful impact on who you are and what you become.
It is one of the key distinguishing characteristics separating those who have successful and cheerful lives from those that do not.
Understanding why we fail gives us an opportunity to gain helpful feedback about our decisions and actions. It gives us a chance to evaluate what is working and not working and make adjustments.
Failure is a crucial requirement to any level of growth or change you will make it your life.
In many ways failure is part of life itself, it is a launchpad to assist us in creating a better life and a bridge to help us become better human beings.
Elizabeth Blackwell’s persistence finally paid off. In 1847, she was accepted as a medical student at the Geneva Medical College in upstate New York. Many doctors and students refused to work with her as she received her medical training.
Their actions and attitudes did not weaken her self confidence.
In 1849, Elizabeth Blackwell became the first woman to receive a medical degree in the United States. When she accepted her degree, the dean of the medical school Dr. Charles Lee stood up and bowed to her in admiration for what she had accomplished.
The graduation ceremony was filled with many women from the town in which the College was located. They came to witness history and cheer for courageous women.
Dr. Blackwell went on to use her persistence, confidence, and self-discipline to build a medical practice, create a facility where women could receive medical internships, and establish a medical college for women.
She was living the example of a trailblazer.
