After Failure was published, Philip Schultz couldn't help notice the strong reactions other people had to it—the "triggering mechanism" of the word itself, as if it was a private shame or fear everyone had, and were grateful for having the entree to talk about.
"It's interesting how many people are coming up to me and talking about their relationship with failure," he says. "Everyone thinks they're a failure. The only people who don't are the ones who really are." —Bruce Grierson
NINE ways to fail better
Some people learn from failure and bounce back stronger. for others, failure destroys them. Be one of the ones who rise from the ashes.
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Lighten up
Most people who bounce back from setbacks have a sense of humor. They know when they're taking things—and themselves—too seriously. We're often so paralyzed by fear of failure that we "self-handicap," sabotaging ourselves by putting an impediment in the way, says personal coach Steven Berglas. Because, hey, if something prevented you from trying your best, you can't be said to have failed, right?
"I'll die if I don't win the Olympics," Berglas sometimes hears from his clients. "Really?" he replies. "On the court? Or will you die of shame?" OK, they acknowledge, they didn't really mean die. But now there's a fissure in their anxiety through which the ridiculousness can seep in.
It's hard to find the funny in the fine grain. Humor is about stepping back for fresh perspective. We assume that's something we're born with, but we can become better at seeing the lighter side by sheer exposure to that way of thinking. And it does take the edge off of failure. After all, an embarrassment today makes for an entertaining story tomorrow.
Join the club
Misery loves company. Just look at the growth of Web-based support groups like "15,000,000 Recession-Touched People" (on Facebook) and Global Depression Support Group (on meetup.com).
There's real value in commiseration. When Montrealer Sylvain Henry started a Facebook support group called "Recession Survivors" after being laid off from a software company, the group became a lightning rod for pain and blame. "You've gotta blame someone, right?" Henry says. "Whose fault is this?" People vented about the lost house, the failed marriage. It was cathartic.
Then something happened. "People vented themselves out," Henry says. "After that came another impulse: Let's do something about this." The members began posting productive hints, little money-saving tips about budget-friendly cookie recipes or how to throw a good garage sale. The site transformed into a clearinghouse of resourceful coping strategies for hard times. Call it Failing Better: the Open-Source Edition.
Feel guilt, not shame
The difference between guilt and shame is the reason we assign as to why failure occurs, notes Richard Robins, a psychologist at the University of California at Davis. Guilt says it's "something I did." But shame means feeling failure occurred because of "something I am"—in which case, you expect failure and don't act to avoid it.
But the cycle of learned helplessness can be broken. Instead of thinking "I'm a failure," think "I'm a good person who made a mistake I can learn from."
If your story about failure is, "It's all my fault," you might need to practice looking outward and ask yourself, "What other things—things that aren't about me—might have caused this negative event?"
On the other hand, if your story is, "It's never about me," you may need to seek out some aspects of the problem you can do something about. Because let's face it, you do mess up—everyone does. In which case you need to own the failure, see what you can learn from it, and move on.
Cultivate optimism
Of the seven learnable skills of resilience—emotion awareness, impulse control, multiperspective thinking, empathy, the belief that you can solve your own problems, taking appropriate risks, and optimism—the most important is optimism, says Karen Reivich, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania. "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so," said Hamlet, and indeed, paying attention to the positive infuses the world with hope—and creates a climate in which failure loses its sting.
The key to resilience is thinking more flexibly and learning to increase your array of options. The psychologist Martin Seligman advocates disputation, in which you think of your mind as a courtroom where negative thoughts are instantly put on trial.
You can rebut these thoughts, and you should. Now you're acting as your own defense counsel, throwing at the court every bit of evidence you can think of to prove the belief is flawed. The bad thought is no longer a lock, and it dies amid the doubt.
Ask not what the world can do for you...
Getting fired and left without savings or health-care coverage is rough, but for some, it carries an unexpected message: "Now you are free." Free to do something more meaningful with your life—like volunteering overseas. If you don't have to earn money right away, ask yourself: How can you be of service to others?
