Well, an interesting question. The problem I have is – which failure do I talk about here?!
I am very British, and in this country we have a very low tolerance for failure. If you don’t get it right first time, you are often consigned to the scrap heap and there is a question mark over you in the future until you ‘prove’ you’ve gotten that nasty habit of failing out of your system. It isn’t conducive to innovation which is why many of our innovators go to the US, Germany or Israel where failure is understood to be the stepping stone to success. Where sometimes a failure to achieve one thing inadvertently creates a huge success, like the story behind Post-It Notes for example. We here in the UK haven’t quite gotten that memo, yet. So when you fail, shame lingers. You judge yourself and you are judged by others. It is, frankly, one of our cultural failures ironically enough.
The first time I knew personal failure was with my A’ Levels, the examinations you take at 18 which get you (or not) into university. I had always planned to go to university to read Law, specifically to Leeds University which was my first choice. The problem was, I was ambivalent about reading Law and I was in no way emotionally mature enough to go halfway up the country to study it. At 18 I was still reeling from my childhood traumas and hadn’t even looked at them let alone thought about dealing with them. They were firmly locked away and I had no intention of ever getting them out again to review or, worse still, relive them. My beloved grandfather hadn’t long died, my mother had remarried and my second grandfather had also not long died. And I’d gone through trauma of a different variety as well. That’s without what happened from the age of 10, this was all recent history. And was the mindset I entered my exams in. I don’t think I addressed how I was feeling about going away consciously, it was all playing out subconsciously in the most beautiful acts of self-sabotage. I flunked one of my A’ Levels spectacularly and scraped by the other two, to the point where I did not achieve the grades I needed to get to university. It was the first time I had ever failed anything, an exam or anything. And wow, did it sting!
That failure did compel me. It compelled me to retake my A’ Levels (and pass them) but still not to go to university at that point in my life. Which was probably the wisest decision. It also meant that, when I did eventually go to university at the age of 23, I was determined to succeed. Failing my A’ Levels meant, in essence, that I was determined never to academically fail again. And I haven’t. I still remember the shock and horror of what I had done, the awful feeling of having failed at something so important. Yes, it motivated me to never want to experience that again, but I also can’t help think it was the best possible outcome for me. I was not, as I say, in any way mature enough to go to university at 18 or 19 and I am sure I would have struggled hugely to the point that I would likely have failed later on.
I started to write about my latest failure, the one which meant my life imploded. But I can’t pinpoint the exact moment that I failed. Yes, I was made redundant because the economic agency I ran did not secure sufficient funding – but none of them did, they all closed. And most of the people who were employed by them struggled to find future employment (too many people, not enough positions), often setting themselves up in consultancy roles. Did I fail? Or was I failed in that instance? I tried the best I could to keep the organisation going, but the way in which the public sector works was not conducive to that. And what happened after that wasn’t failure, it was choices I made. And often choices I consciously made. No, I didn’t fail then. I just had to suffer the consequences of my choices. Choices that I am not sure I wouldn’t make again, I would just do some things slightly differently so it wasn’t all as dramatic as it ended up being. But that doesn’t mean to say I failed.
Maybe that was an apparent failure, I know those who love to judge me see me as an abject failure. I don’t care about their opinions because they’ve never bothered to ask me about my life, just judged it from the outside looking in based on what other people have told them. But I must admit I am spurred into action. I am spurred into proving them wrong. It won’t happen overnight, I know that, but it will happen. The motivation is very strong in me! That’s why I have set up a Skool community with my business partner, why I am very active on TikTok, why I blog on here regularly and why I am now being asked for coaching sessions and why my books are still selling. It’s going to happen, I am going to rise like the phoenix from the ashes. Because those who have judged my apparent failure, and me, have spurred me on to do so.
Failure in and of itself is far from a bad thing. It shows us important lessons, it prepares us for future disappointments, and it motivates us to do better and more the next time around. We learn from failing, not from getting everything right. I just wish the culture in my country agreed with that!
Louisa Simpson 