When Failure Strikes: 5 Habits To Adopt After Falling Short

It's difficult to communicate your failures to people who don't know the emotional toll of going through such convieniently-named "learning experiences." I quote that phrase because when you're fresh off a relationship, laid off your job, or getting outright fired from said job, the last thing you want to do is call it a learning experience. You want to lash out, blame, rail at life, and blame fate's work at the heart of it all. You have been through so much, you DESERVE what you didn't get. Oh, I've been there.

It was 2013, and I was seriously high on life after a number of years just trying to survive here in Seattle when I felt no one would give me a chance. When I met the right person at the time for the PERFECT position with an up-and-coming startup here in Seattle. Everything I believed about sticking out the hard times was validated. Just two months down the line, a coworker in the marketing department was trying to get me fired because they didn't like the way I was doing the job that very person was relieved of prior to my arrival. I felt betrayed by my boss for letting me go when all I wanted to do was focus and do my job, a job he was praising me for only weeks before.  

So when things don't go your way -- be it a dream job like mine, a relationship, a professional venture gone wrong somehow -- there are a million ways to feel negatively, and rightly so. There lies a moment in time to grieve and wonder what the hell just happened. Give yourself time to process the experience; allow for digestion and acceptance of the reality of it all. One has to keep in mind, though, that life has a way of saying when it's time to get back off your ass and move on. There's simply nothing else you can do. You have to get up off the pavement and fight for the right of the rest of your life. With that mindset, here are five positive steps you can take to work your way through failure and persevere following a personal loss or setback. 

1. Confront the truth of your circumstances and take responsibility
   When I lost my position, I felt pretty solid I didn't do anything wrong to warrant such a blatantly unfair career loss. In the end, it wasn't about that; I overlooked certain aspects of the situation which allowed such moments of friction to occur. I had to own up to those things, and as much as I loved the job, and considering the people I was working with it might not have been the best fit. Difficult to see or admit at the time but possible, nonetheless.

2. Forgive yourself
   It can be hard to see this one when you're wailing and flailing and blaming anything and everything under the sun. It doesn't look or feel like it, but oftentimes deep inside you're masking the pain of knowing you had a role in your circumstances.
   Sooner or later (preferably sooner), you MUST LET GO of that guilt. The pain with which you continue beating yourself about the head and neck will not improve your circumstances or lend itself to life's future victories in any way. In fact it will find a way to infest and rot anything within its grasp. Do NOT take this lack of forgiveness lightly; it can ruin lives, much less careers.
   Friends, you have to forgive yourself these weights you carry. Such weights have consequences.

3. Failure is often life's greatest learning tool; wear it out, then buy a new one
   "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better." Samuel Beckett quoted one of the most inspiring yet admittedly overused quotes of our time. When failure strikes, we cannot be fearful about getting back off the canvas -- securing that next client, giving that next speech, moving on to that next relationship. It's the actions we take that can springboard us into something better, something greater. It's only AFTER those failures, though (there may be many), that we find the confidence, experience, and savvy to avoid the cracks and mistakes of the past. In the end, we have to TAKE ACTION to move on from those bruises.

4. Do NOT get stuck in the easy trap of feeling like a victim
   At the time, I didn't KNOW the ownership role I had in that situation. The whole "This was put upon me, I didn't want this to happen" attitude. Well, I kinda did. A central role, in fact. There is no quicker way to continue falling down the rabbit hole of what you are going through than insisting on the mindset of "oh, there's nothing I can do, i.e., I got screwed/the breakup wasn't my fault/my business failed and I still don't know how it happened". The conscious ability to regain your power is by TAKING RESPONSIBILITY and OWNERSHIP of your situation by learning from it and knowing how to deal with it or outright avoid it in the future. If you don't, you will be inviting the opposite -- more pain, more unfortunate situations -- and the cycle begins anew. Acknowledge your role.

5. Rediscover your "grit" and recommit to a new plan with a new goal or approach
   Part of coming to accountability in your circumstance entails acknowledging where you are. Mentally, you're thinking, I'm here right now, at this moment. Now that I acknowledge where I am, these specific actions are needed to get onto the proper road. Obviously, there is nothing wrong with licking your wounds. Your situation may warrant a while to gather yourself, assess your situation, deal with the victim-hood you may be feeling, and then move forward. After I was let go, I didn't have much time to focus. I needed monies! But for a long time, I was really bitter about the hand I was dealt, and let's just say, personal or public, it doesn't do you any favors to not address what you're feeling. That grit and passion for what you do, it's always been there. Tap into it. You have the power to endure.

If you're anything like me, you've been told it would be like this. Life is hard. You will be disappointed. You will be tested. What is harder is the people who will disappoint or wrong you. You may be surprised. But regardless of who or what happened, you know what is the most powerful feeling and sense of actionable motivation you can give yourself? The kind that pulls you out of that dark alley of defeat, sense of failure, and self-loathing?

You need to get up, for the simple fact that you don’t have a choice.