How to Redefine Failure and Take Action Anyway: A Mental Health Approach

But if you can shift your relationship with how you see failure, it will start to change how you deal with it. And you'll be way more willing to take that risk on yourself than just avoid it because you're afraid of the feelings that failure is going to create. Welcome to the let's Talk about it podcast, where we are taking the fear and frustration out of asking for help when it comes to your emotional and mental health and giving you what you need to think about things a bit differently. I'm Lori Streeter, licensed therapist and certified hypnotherapist. And with each episode, I'll bring you thoughts, techniques, or a guest to help you find your breakthroughs and live a healthier, happier life. Are you ready? Let's Talk About It. Welcome back to another episode of let's Talk about it with Lori Streeter. I'm pumped to have this conversation with you today because failure is such a big deal. It affects us. And I don't know anybody who has been successful at every single thing that they've ever done. I have failed at plenty of things. I have failed at relationships. I have failed at things that I've done, programs that I've written. I was in kickboxing. I have lost fights. Like, I've failed so many times in my life. And yes, it sucks. But then you just have to say, what can I learn from this? Because if you don't, if you don't start to flip your perspective on what failure means to you, you will stay stuck and you will stay in the awful feelings of, of the failure. But what I want to talk about with you is the fact that failure is not a feeling. People say, I feel like a failure. It's not a feeling. Failure is something that happens when something doesn't work out. Okay, so I googled definition of failure. Literally the first thing that comes up is lack of success, the omission of expected or required action. So if something doesn't work out to your liking or your expectations, by definition it means that you have failed. But it doesn't have to be a bad thing. The feelings that are behind failure, the feelings that failure, that things not working out bring about, that's where we struggle. It's the feelings that cause us the distress when failure is present, when things aren't working out, when we're struggling, when there is that lack of success in whatever we're trying to do. It's not the failure that's the problem. It's the feelings that are created or that come about when failure happens. So failure When I talk about this with my clients, when I've experienced it in my own life, the feelings around failure tend to be things like disappointment, sadness, grief, anger, embarrassment, right? Things on maybe the more negative end of the feeling spectrum. Like, nobody's waking up in the morning looking to. Like, I can't wait until I feel sad or angry or embarrassed today. Like, these aren't feelings that we are necessarily wanting, which is why we deem them as bad. Or. But they're just feelings. They don't have to be good or bad. They are just feelings because then the feelings, the thoughts, are wrapped up with the feelings. So if I fail at something, if something doesn't work out to my expectations and I feel embarrassed because someone saw that it didn't work out for me, and now I have thoughts that I'm looking stupid or that they're judging me, or that I'm never going to be respected, whatever it is, that's where the problem lies. But if I can recognize how I feel and start to shift my perspective and address the thoughts that are wrapped up with the feelings now, I can have an entirely different meaning of failure. I can use it to my benefit. It's those feelings, the sadness, the grief, the anger, the disappointment, the embarrassment, those feelings that are creating the thoughts around the failure. That's why it feels so awful. Failure isn't a problem. I look at it like alcohol, right? Alcohol isn't a problem. If alcohol was a problem, it would be an issue for everybody. I don't have a problem with alcohol, but alcoholics have a problem with alcohol. So alcohol is not the issue. It's someone's relationship with the alcohol. It's how they deal with the feelings, the stress or numbing out. It's how they deal with their life with the alcohol that creates the issue. So failure is not the problem. Nobody is going to have their life work out a hundred percent of the time, every day, all day. Like, that's just not the way that it works, unfortunately, right? We're going to experience letdown. We're going to experience failure. We're going to experience lack of success. We're going to experience things not working out to how we expected them or to our standards. That is just the fortunate, unfortunate thing about life. But dealing with your definition of failure, how you perceive it, how it affects you, your feelings about how you define what failure means to you, that is what is going to have a significant impact on your life. So if you can think, the last time you failed at something, the last time a relationship didn't work out or something didn't work out to your liking or that you failed, whatever that means to you? How did you feel? How did you feel? Were you sad? Were you angry? Were you angry with someone else? Were you angry with yourself? Were you embarrassed because other people were around to witness your failure? I was watching the Olympics because I think a lot of people were, because they were on. And I was a diver in high school, my freshman and sophomore year, and there was a girl who had a failed dive. Like, she literally hit the end of the board and just jumped off. And it's called a failed dive. And my husband was like, I have never seen that happen. I've seen people mess up a dive, but I've literally never seen someone in a competition. Not that we watch diving all the time, but it is just not something that you see a lot. And I really don't remember if she came back and I don't know if it was her last dive or if she came back and did another dive and kind of redeemed herself. But that experience for her, she's either gonna learn from it or she's gonna sit and dwell and sit in the. Being pissed off and being sad and all of the feelings that failure that that failed dive maybe are bringing about for her. So. Not that she doesn't get to be upset. That sucks. Especially in a competition like the Olympics, right? Like, I feel for her. And I. While I haven't competed in the Olympics in high school, I have had failed dives. I've. We called it, like, balking. I balked a dive in a meet. It sucks. It's so embarrassing. I'm mad at myself. It was something that I was doing fine in practice, but then, you know, pressure was on, and it just. It sucked, right? It was a failure, and it was embarrassing, and I was angry, and I was really sad, and I was really upset, right? Like, I can remember all of those feelings, but if I would have stayed in those feelings and completely let them take over my life, I never would have gotten back up on a diving board, right? So that girl who had a failed dive at the Olympics, if she stays in those feelings and she literally let the feelings of failure define her life, she's never going to dive again, which I'm guessing she's not going to let happen. So she's going to deal with all of the feelings, and she's going to deal with the sadness and the embarrassment and the anger or whatever was going on within her, but she's probably going to get back up there and remind herself, I can do this. It was a fluke. I don't know what happened. Or here's what happened, right? She's going to learn from the failure. So think about the last time you experienced a failure. And it doesn't obviously have to be like something on an Olympic style stage, but think about something that you experienced that didn't work out the way you really expected it to, or that you wanted it to. What feelings did you have about that failure? And how did they define you moving forward? Did you let them define you moving forward? Because that's where it becomes an issue. So feel the feelings. Identify the sadness and the anger and the grief and the embarrassment and the disappointment and all of the feelings that are wrapped up with that thing that didn't work out. Identify it, honor them, acknowledge it, and then say, okay, this is going to happen. This is life. I'm not going to be perfect all the time. Nobody is. Nobody's expecting you to be perfect. Those pressures are often the pressures that we put on ourselves. So if you can redefine how you look at failure, be able to identify and deal with the feelings now you can say the next time that something doesn't work out to your liking or something doesn't meet your expectations or you fail at something, you can say, hey, that sucks. That really sucks. Here's all the feelings I'm feeling and what am I going to do with it? How am I going to learn from this? How am I going to move forward? How am I going to use this situation to empower the rest of my life? So, so that I'm not defined and I'm not literally taken over by all of those feelings that failure creates within us. So I'm super passionate about this because failure is how we learn. It is not something that we like. Failure can create a lot of emotion. I know people who, who just want to fail because they want to get better. Like they will try things and try things and try things until something works out. Right? Their relationship with failure is completely different. I'm somewhere in the middle. I don't love to fail, but I'm also like not trying to put myself out there and fail and fail and fail and fail and fail. Like it's doesn't. It obviously doesn't feel good, right? But I'm also not trying to avoid it. I'm somewhere in the middle, but I'm way more willing to try something with the possibility that it might not work out, with the possibility that I might fail and have to deal with those feelings than completely avoid it altogether. Because if I avoid the situation completely, and I totally don't even try, I'm not giving myself the opportunity to learn and move forward and grow from what I learned about that thing not working out. This is just again, something I'm so passionate about. It comes up without fail, no pun intended, without fail, in not every conversation I have with my client, but within my relationships with my clients. Because failure is just part of life and it's something that we have to discuss in therapy and it's something I deal with. It is literally something that everybody I know deals with at some point or another and probably more than once. It's normal, for lack of better word, it's going to happen. But if you can shift your relationship with how you see failure, it will start to change how you deal with it and you'll be way more willing to take that risk on yourself. Then just avoid it because you're afraid of the feelings that failure is going to create. Okay, there's my rant. There is my rant on failure. I hope that this gives you an entirely different perspective. If it is something that you struggle with, if you are holding yourself back, if you are not doing things in your life, if you're not making decisions or taking things on because you are afraid, afraid, or you're trying to avoid the feelings that possible failure might bring about for you, I hope that this shifts things for you. I hope that this just normalizes it for you and gives you the permission to do things regardless of the feelings on the other end of it because you will make it through. And the sooner you permit yourself to fail to deal with those feelings, to face those feelings, the sooner you can move through them and learn and grow from that entire experience. If you need more reminders like this, not necessarily a 15 minute podcast, but little brief reminders or quotes or tips, I every day at 9am, I send out something to my text messages. I text you a tip or a reminder and I reinforce these messages because they are so incredibly important to our well being and our ability to continue to grow as human beings. So if that's something that you want, if you would like me to send you messages like I do many other people, I love sending them out. But if you want to be part of that text podcast to 630-228-1002 and you can get these little tidbits, you can get these reminders, you can get text straight from my phone to yours that remind you of these things that are going to keep you inspired and motivated and just continuing to help your life move forward. So I hope to see you on my text list and I hope that this podcast helped shift your idea of failure and that you can use it as an experience instead of holding yourself back because you're avoiding what failure means to you. Redefine it. What does it look like? How are you going to use it to your benefit and deal with the feelings that failure is creating for you? I can't wait to hear how this shifts your perspective. Failure is inevitable. I appreciate your time. I'll talk to you on the next episode. Now go fail and deal with it so that you can move forward in your life. Failure is not a bad word. It's not a dirty word. It's just something that we have to deal with and shift our relationship with. I will talk to you again soon. Thank you so much for spending this time with me today. If you loved this episode, it would mean so much if you would share it with someone who you think would love it too. And don't forget to leave a review with your thoughts, what resonated, or even what you'd like to hear more of. Because I promise you, if something's on your mind, it's on other people's minds too. I appreciate your help in getting these messages on mental health out into the world. And until next time, cheers to living a healthier, happier life.