Congratulations! You just failed.

Aspire to Succeed 2 Minutes

Failure doesn’t kill you…it increases your desire to make something happen. A quote by famous actor Kevin Costner

Do you remember the first time you failed? How did it feel to be a failure? What did you do about it? Failure should be your motivator to stand up and try again. 

Failure Is A Positive

Do not shy from looking back on these moments of failure as the positive catalysts that will carry you to success. You can learn a lot about yourself. Think about what drove you to take that step and do not spend time reflecting on the fact you failed. It is not easy, so you have to be gentle. Allow yourself to go through what I like to call the four stages of OOPS!                          

Failure Hurts

Imagine this…You participated in the swimming (or any activity of your choice) competition even though you did not think you were ready. You were the last swimmer to complete the race. Everyone had left the pool area by the time you got out of the pool.

Ouch! Waah!! Ugh!!! That hurt. You are crying inside. Leaving the pool area was not a happy experience to say the least.

Ow! Boo! Ick! Now you are in the second stage. You have to admit that this experience hurts. You still cannot believe this happened. It is embarrassing and sickening to think about.

Pfft! Umm! Bah! Time to move on. Take a deep breath. You are hesitant, but you start to think that perhaps it was a good idea to try it out. You got out of your comfort zone. Hey, at least now you know where you rank. But wow that felt bad…no wait, that was awful! This is the time to say, “whatever” and it does not matter. At least no one was at the pool snickering as you passed.

Sheesh! Yee-haw! Oomph! You have made it to the final stage. Declare to yourself and to others when you are ready that going through that experience was not a big deal. In fact, you are excited to try it again. Perhaps not so soon. You realize that you need to seriously practice for a month or two. You could decide that while you enjoy swimming, you do not enjoy swimming competitions. Alternatively, you could say you realized how much you hated swimming and now you are excited to try something new.

Failure Makes You Stronger

You have experienced failure and you are stronger because of it.

You now know you can fail again, easily pick up the pieces and move on. You are stronger than you knew. It is time to fail yet again. It is time for another OOPS!

What are you training for? What are you hoping to fail (or perhaps deep down, not fail)?

Published by Dr. Hoda Kilani CPCC

I am a passionate career literacy and gifted education advocate! If you like talking about either of my two passions, let’s chat. For the past few years, I have been a career and educational coach. Before that, I wore many hats experimenting with every opportunity that presented itself and throughout it all, my passion and commitment was to help others succeed and make a difference in the world. I have been working from home since 2013! In the past few years, I developed a private career coaching practice Right Career Fit, earned a Master of Education, a Doctor of Education as well as a career coaching certificate. The success of my private practice is a testament to my talent development and resource planning skills. I am a lifelong learner with a natural intellectual curiosity and I love challenges. Presenting and attending conferences across North America (in person and virtually) reflect my belief in the value of advocating for my two passions. I am also constantly looking for opportunities to influence public policy and increase support for the teaching and learning communities with a focus on inclusive career practices in Canada and globally. This is why I am a Chair/Board Director on various Boards. The past year has been a mix of significant losses and unforeseen challenges as well as amazing opportunities and unanticipated gains for many of us. I hope everyone is doing well...Despite all of this, each of us survived in our own way. Yet we continue to feel overwhelmed and concerned about the forces that the new year could bring. I encourage you to get involved in your communities, personal or professional. There is nothing like having the support of people who care about you during the ups and downs of this era. To close, I strive to be a spokesperson for the importance of career education and continue to work with a variety of media to create awareness of its value. I am on a mission to have #careerliteracy trend across social media. If you care to join me, let’s chat!

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