So, you failed a test, or maybe this entire semester's
just been terrible and you feel like the whole thing
has been a failure and now your life, basically, boils down
to nothing but this. (book slams)
Where do you go from there?
Well, that's what I want to talk about today, and I feel
like this video boils down, really, to just two main points.
Number one, failure is not the end of the world.
It's not nearly as bad as you think it is,
and it happens to absolutely everyone.
And, number two, learning from that failure, becoming
resilient to it, and re-trying in a smarter way, these are
all essential skills to learn.
And, I think failure seems so monumental and terrible
because we don't talk about it, even though it happens
to everyone, none of us wants to be vulnerable enough
to put our failures out there, it's uncomfortable.
So, we tend to just project our successes and keep
the failures bottled up inside and each of us has to deal
with them alone.
So, that's where I want to start.
I want to put a few of my own personal demons and failures
out there to let you know that, if you're currently
dealing with a failed test or something else, we're both
standing on the exact same playing field.
Off just the top of my head, I can think of two instances
where I failed exams in college.
There was a physics exam I failed during my freshman
year, and then, in my junior year, there was a core
part of my major, a computer networking class, and I failed
and exam because I was just like not paying attention
during that semester.
And, those two failures were pretty bad, but they pale
in comparison to something that happened in high school
that I have not wanted to talk about ever since it happened.
But, I'm gonna put it out there because, hopefully
it's useful to you guys.
So, in high school, my senior year, I got this really cool
part time job, and I worked a lot of part time jobs
in high school, ever since I was 14, in fact, but this one
was really cool, which makes it all the more worse
that I only was there for three months.
And, I was only there for three months because I got fired.
And not because some politics or the economy or whatever,
or like Godzilla was about to smash my cubicle.
I got fired because I was crappy at my job, and I didn't
respect the position, and they fired me,
totally justifiably.
It was like a flat on my face failure.
And, I remember walking out of the building, I was like,
"That's it, my life is over.
"No one will ever hire me again.
"Why would they hire me?
"I've already violated somebody's trust."
And I was like, "Might as well give up now, right?"
But, looking back, everything was fine.
I still went to college.
I had a lot of part time jobs in college.
I did really well at all of them.
I even went to a full time internship and now
I'm running my own business, because I learned from
those mistakes.
And with the exams, it was the exact same thing.
I learned from my mistakes.
I learned that I wasn't paying attention.
I had to buckle down.
And that's what those failures were, they were just valleys
in this overall, crazy graph, trend of our life's progress.
Because, it isn't just this linear, nice curve upward.
There's going to be peaks and valleys,
successes and failures.
Hopefully, the overall trend is upward, but it's really
volatile, so, if you find yourself in a valley right now,
a failure, that's just part of your journey.
You're gonna get out of it.
But, how do you get out of it?
What's the best way to potentially get out?
Well, that's what the rest of this video is about,
and I really think it boils down to six steps in a process.
And I want to lay this process out for you, but first,
I just got to warn you, near the end of this video,
I am going to drill into your soul.
Okay, maybe that's a nut heavy, but I am gonna say some
words to you that might pull you out of your warm little
comfort zone, 'cause I think you might need to hear them.
But, let's lay the foundation first,
with that six step process.
The first step is to figure out, do you need to do
damage control right away?
Is there some sort of reaction that the failure warrants,
right away, to make sure that further bad stuff
doesn't happen?
For instance, maybe you just completely skipped a test,
for some reason.
Well, obviously you need to contact the professor
right away to see if there's any way you can make up
a test, because, obviously, it wasn't your fault that ninjas
attacked you on your way to the testing center.
It just happens, like these things happen, and hopefully,
your professor will understand.
But, if you have found out that there's basically nothing
you need to do right away, you just need to kind of
move on, over time, gradually, then I think the first
thing to do is to give yourself some distance
from the problem.
Like, right away, failures seem monumental, they seem
earth crushing, like everything is bad, and your emotions
are just blaring sirens in your brain, and you really
can just, only give yourself distance.
There's nothing really good that's gonna happen
right away, because you need to let these emotions subside.
So, sleep on it, or talk with a friend, vent a little bit,
or play a stupid video game, forget the world, and once
those emotions do go away, then that's when logic can
take over and start to do some more useful stuff.
And, at that point, what you need to do is to figure out
what caused the failure?
Like, when you play a video game and you die, you do
retry, but you're also trying to figure out like,
"Why did I die?
"Okay this pit was too far to jump over without
"getting a running start first, so now I need to run."
Identifying the points of failure is critical for retrying
and succeeding.
That's what engineers do and that's what you need to do.
So, figure out what was it that caused me to fail this test.
Was I overwhelmed?
Did I just take too hard of a class?
Did I need a tutor?
Or was I just completely distracted and unmotivated
to pay attention in class?
Now, once you've figured out the problem, once you've
figured out the most likely cause, then the next step
is to develop a plan for retrying in a smarter way,
adapting, and dealing with that point of failure.
You can't just try in the exact same way, right?
That's the definition of insanity.
So, if you were unmotivated to study, then maybe you need
to get a tutor or just an accountability buddy, or maybe
you need to say, "I'm not gonna study in my dorm,
"I'm going to commit myself to going to the library
"three days a week, I'm gonna meet with my study buddy,
"and we're going to study for at least three hours,
"cumulatively, over the week."
Now you've got that plan.
And step five is to retry, just like you do in a video game.
And also, the last step, be willing to ask for help
if you need it.
I've had some people who've asked questions on my videos
in the comments, being like, "How do I get help, 'cause
"I'm too embarrassed or too scared to ask for help
"in class, 'cause I don't want to look stupid."
And, that couldn't be further from the truth, asking
for help is showing that you're smart enough not to accept
ignorance out of pride or some fear of embarrassment.
And, now that you've failed something, you know for a fact,
the writing is on the wall,
that you're not above needing help.
So, if people are willing to provide assistance, be humble
enough to accept it.
If you're on a sinking ship and somebody comes by
in a row boat to save you, jump on that row boat.
So, that is the process for dealing with failure, and to end
this video, I just want to give you a little bit
of motivation, because to be honest, a lot of people,
this is the sad truth, but a lot of people just kind of
let life happen to them.
And, a lot of people let their past decisions,
past bad decisions, past failures, set the course
for the rest of their lives.
Don't be one of those people.
Very few failures will keep you down and prevent
you from retrying and building back up.
Most failures, as long as you're willing to work,
and willing to analyze what caused the failure, most of them
are just opportunities for you to get smarter, and for you
to adapt, and for you to become resilient.
In a speech she gave at Harvard University, back in 2008,
J. K. Rowling once said that "The Knowledge that you have
"emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that
"you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive."
Failure is not the end, it's just an opportunity
to gain insight.
So, if you don't like where your past failures
and past decisions have gotten you, then start looking
at what caused those failures and retry in a smarter way.
Or, to re-frame that statement, if you don't like who
you were yesterday, then be willing to put some steps
into action today, and tomorrow, and the next day,
to start changing that person.
Now, hopefully I didn't get too heavy
at the end here, for you, and hopefully this video
was helpful to you in some way.
Either way, thank you so much for watching, and as always,
I'll see you next week.
(inspirational music)