Embrace Failure to Push Your Skills to the Next Level

Failing is just a sign that you are doing something outside of your current capabilities. When you are learning a new skill, you will inevitably make mistakes. You are, after all, trying to do something that you don’t yet know how to do.

Rather than being afraid of failure, embrace it and be curious. Try to understand why something didn’t work, so that you can improve it for next time. Eventually, you will be able to do what you couldn’t do before.

Learning to walk

When we are young, we are not afraid of failing. A baby that is learning to walk continues to try, even after hundreds of times falling over. They don’t decide that walking is too hard or not worth the effort. They’re not worried about making mistakes or humiliating themselves. They walk, they fall, and they get back up.

We continue to see this throughout childhood, where most children are not afraid of trying, and in the beginning, failing at new skills. As we grow older, we start to notice our abilities and how people evaluate us. This makes us afraid of challenges, of looking stupid and not being able to do something well.

Some people avoid things they are not good at, and some think that they are just no good. Many people stop practising the things they don’t know very well, and not surprisingly, they don’t get any better.

We like to do the things that we know

‘We often stick to the things we do well and avoid the things we have failed or have never tried. This prevents us from developing and growing as humans. There is no learning without some difficulty and fumbling.’ -Howard Gardner, in Self-Renewal

It feels safe to do what we already know and stay with what has worked before. However, this will not help you grow your skills or grow as a person.

‘I am always doing what I cannot do so that I may learn how to do it.’ -Pablo Picasso

The only way to improve and learn new skills is to try to do something that you don’t yet know how to and with time and effort, it will become part of your skillset.

Be courageous

A good definition of courage is ‘having fear and going ahead anyway.’ It is way more daring to make a mistake than to play it safe by not trying. By trying something new, you could look a bit silly at first. However, this will quickly be forgotten as you start improving.

A sign of a fast skill learner is that they are willing to move through the difficult period when they look a bit stupid, to improve their performance at the skill.

Difficulty = Challenge

Instead of viewing difficulty as a problem, try to look at it as a challenge. Some people are afraid of trying and learning new things throughout their lives, while others keep putting themselves in challenging new situations.

It is much better to look at challenges as opportunities to acquire new skills and do something that you previously couldn’t. Mistakes don’t mean you are stupid. They are information that can guide you to learn something.

The goal isn’t to fail

Don’t just look at the things you are doing wrong. Look at the things you are doing wrong, and change them. You will not improve by deliberately failing, not giving your best effort or not paying attention to what you are doing.

The goal is to try to do something and almost make it. To get a bit closer than last time. And then to eventually make it.

If it is easy to do, it will not feel like a great accomplishment

I’ve never been proud of anything I didn’t put a lot of effort into. Only after practising something for a long time will you feel that you have achieved something. In the end, the effort it took you to get there will seem worthwhile. This reminds me of one of my favourite quotes from Rafael Nadal.

‘Una lección que he aprendido es que si el trabajo que hago fuera fácil, no me generaría tanta satisfacción. La emoción de ganar es directamente proporcional al esfuerza que hago por lograrlo.’

‘A lesson that I have learned is that if the work I’ve done was easy, it doesn’t give me much satisfaction. The emotion of winning is directly proportional to the effort I put in to achieve it.’

Therefore, the more effort you put in to achieve something, the better you will feel when you get there.

Michael Jordan

Jordan is famous for embracing his failures. In one of his ads for Nike, he says: ‘I’ve missed more than nine thousand shots. I’ve lost almost three hundred games. Twenty-six times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.’

And every time he made a mistake in a game, you can be sure he went back and practised that shot a hundred times.

Expert performers don’t only practice a lot. They continuously practice things that test the limits of their abilities. They try to reach higher, very often fail, and then try again, until they get it right.

‘I can accept failure. Everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.’ -Michael Jordan

Jordan always focused on practising what he couldn’t do, and this dedication to challenging himself made him an expert in turning his weaknesses into his greatest strengths. If you want to improve, you have to show up and do the work. Showing up when you don’t want to. Pushing forward when it hurts.

Failure can hurt a bit, and it is natural to feel down after making a mistake. However, what matters is how you recover from it. Does the disappointment inspire you to work harder and learn from the error? Or do you get stuck and allow those negative feelings to linger?

Learn from failure

Failing isn’t worth much unless you learn something from it. Always make sure you pay attention immediately after you make a mistake. Your goal is to use this information to try to get closer to performing the desired action.

Failure provides an excellent opportunity to learn because it highlights the limitations of your capabilities. But, you don’t need to redo all the mistakes that have ever been done. Learn from your own mistakes, and also from the mistakes of others. Be aware and take note right after you fail at something, and use it as a guidepost to improve.

Take home message

When you are learning a new skill, mistakes will inevitably happen. But mistakes need not be detrimental. By paying attention and learning from your mistakes, you can grow and improve your abilities.

The real failure only happens when you give up or don’t even try. So, get out there, start learning a new skill, fail, learn from the failure, get it right. Repeat.

Thanks for reading, following and sharing ! :)

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