Day 330 (Three-Hundred & Thirty) of 365 days

Failing Forward explains that most people fail at some point in their lives it is how you chose to learn from the failures. These failures allow us to learn from our mistakes. You can turn a failure into a learning experience and while it is hard to face any type of failure once you accept that you failed you can grow from that situation. Failing forward means that a person embraces failing as stepping stones for future successes. To fail forward means that you have chosen to value every failure for the lessons learned and then apply those lessons in future efforts, even if those efforts might also fail. When you are failing forward, each failure moves you closer to ultimate success.

If you have the heart of an entrepreneur and dream of starting your own business, then you too must lean into the idea of failing forward. Failing will happen, but those fails don’t have to be major setbacks, instead, they are opportunities to move forward towards your ultimate success.

To be clear, embracing the idea of failing forward does not mean that you are striving to fail. It doesn’t even mean that you enjoy failing. It does mean that you understand that failure is part of the journey to success and that you won’t let the fear of failing stop you from taking right-sized risks. Likewise, it means that you will not allow the pain and embarrassment of actually failing to be the end of your journey to success.

The potential for failure is much less scary when you define that nightmare and come to terms with the idea that you can live with failing…if you have to. This means taking an honest look at what failing in this project looks like and how you would deal with that challenge. If it doesn’t destroy you, then you just need a plan to overcome the setback of a failed project. You also need a plan for dealing with potential success.

I’m not recommending that you only risk what you can painless lose. Instead, I’m recommending that you only risk what you could lose without destroying your life. The fear of pain makes us work harder, longer, and hopefully smarter. Start small, and with each success, your risk for the next project will grow. In time, your right-sized risk will dwarf the one you started with. From personal experience, I can guarantee that being blindsided by failing honestly makes failing way harder. Do everything in your power to avoid surprising causes of failure.

Everyone fails. Some people fail more than other people. But why? Is it that smart people fail less than average people? Is it that rich people fail less than poor people?
Educated less than uneducated? No. It’s none of those things. Everyone fails and the only reason that some people fail less is that they do less.

Don’t do less; do more. Do more in your personal life and your business life. Take risks and embrace the fails that will come. Risk often, fail, and sometimes, fail spectacularly. But, always fail forward