Failure Is My Success

After reading Mindset and the articles posted from Harvard and the New York Times, I’ve decided that they don’t really change my view on failure. Mindset more or less says that failure is a difficult thing no matter what. If you have a growth mindset failure isn’t going to be fun and if you have a fixed mindset failure won’t be fun. That appears to be a pretty fundamental feeling towards failure by most people, but I often see failure much differently. Furthermore, Mindset makes a clear distinction again about how people with growth mindsets and fixed mindsets differ when they experience failure. The author more or less states that people with a growth mindset would make a mental note that based on whatever outcome that they had failed. It then delves on the fact that people with a growth mindset then approach the failure as a chance to explore a different approach and find success. People with a fixed mindset though see a failure more as a moment to blame the failure on themselves personally and come to the conclusions that they failed and that’s it. People with a fixed mindset are much less likely to explore a different approach than an individual with a growth mindset and seek a different outcome to a situation.

            Personally I believe failure is a great thing. Failure is what creates growth in individuals and allows them to show their true colors. I can’t even begin to describe how many times in my life that I’ve failed at something and only seen it as an opportunity to go back and be successful. I use a lot of baseball analogies in my blogs, but that is merely because I’ve grown up around it and have a fairly decent understanding of what failure is. Ted Williams said, “Baseball is the only field of endeavor where a man can succeed three times out of ten and be considered a good performer.” This quote has always stuck with me and I feel fits in great with these readings because this quote demonstrates that the other seven out of ten times, as a baseball player I’m going to fail. This failure though is not something I dwell on or get feelings of disappointment. I take the failure and go out everyday to the field and try to beat the odds. Even though the likelihood of an individual beating the odds by a large or even small margin are unlikely, it is our fuel to the fire. It is what keeps me going everyday. Failure is my success.