We strive to achieve our best. We set goals that will lead us to meet our objectives. We persevere despite the many obstacles that come our way. However, there are no guarantees that what we set out to attain will be achieved as expected. Along the way, there will be major disappointments, unexpected setbacks, delays, and, yes, loses. But, do not confuse loses with failures.
It was surely not the case for Spencer Silver who, by mistake, made a weak adhesive when he was trying to make a stronger one only to realize that the former one could actually be spread on little pieces of paper and, accidentally, post-it notes were invented.
Likewise, in sports, the baseball player Kirk Gibson was asked to bat despite having both of his legs injured. He was behind the count, but still remained confident that the right pitch would eventually come. And, it did. He homered his seventh pitch helping the Dodger win that game and, eventually, the World Series in 1988.
There are countless of experiences where unfortunate episodes or circumstances led to wonderful results. If every one of those individuals had given up on their experiences or surrendered to the apparent bad luck, then many of the wonderful gifts we enjoy from society today would not be around.
There is a HUGE difference between losing and failing. When we face a challenge, we have two options: we either try to address it and do the best we can or we sit back and do nothing. When we embark to accomplish our goals, we will experience successes and losses. BOTH of them are part of the learning process. When we take advantage of the learning that comes from embracing this process, we become wiser and, therefore, better able to improve our probabilities to reach our goals next time. However, when we do not take an initiative toward progress and become passive, then we have failed.
For some reason, there is a big stigma toward the word “losing.” It tends to have a negative connotation, but when we really pay attention to it, it provides a very rich source of information that can ultimately be used to our advantage. When we step back and evaluate those moments that did not work as expected, they become our best learning experiences. We can evaluate what happened, understand how to make it better next time, and analyze it so we can make necessary changes. Learning can only happen when we embrace losing as part of the process.
As Churchill once said, “All men make mistakes, but only the wise men learn from their mistakes.”
Embrace your learning journey and accept that losing is just part of the learning process. You will have learned from your experience rather than feeling regret for not having taken action.