Let me make myself clear: I’m not calling you a failure. Every time we hear the word “failure,” it brings about such a negative connotation, and we’ve all been guilty of thinking in such a way a few times more than none. It’s alright; I’m guilty of it too. I didn’t realize that thinking of failure as such a bad thing was draining me mentally. In the span of a month, almost everything that I never thought could happen to me happened, and it was as though my life had been turned on its head. I began to spiral in thoughts of self-doubt and guilt, wondering what I could have done to prevent what happened when, in truth, it was simply out of my control. I’ll admit, it was difficult to come out of such a mindset, so as much as you’re learning, I’m learning too.

Failure is an event, not an identity

In my freshman year of college, I hated failure. I saw it as the one thing that I never wanted to have in my life. On the surface, that doesn’t sound like such a bad thing, right? (I mean, come on, who really wants failure?) Unfortunately, I took this desire a bit too far, to the point where I thought failure could never be a thing in my life since I was making the right decisions and doing the right things. Turns out failure isn’t something that you can just ward off. It’s almost like how even though there are differing time zones, we will all still experience a December 31, 11:59 p.m. Your yesterday might be someone’s today.

In the same way, every single person on this earth will experience some sort of failure in their life. But that does not mean that you should then take your failure as who you are. Experiencing failure and being a failure are two very different things, and I don’t believe that the latter should ever be something that you should consider in your life. You excel at something, so you must find it, and nobody else can figure that out for you.

In my senior year of high school, there was a picture that my physics teacher had on his board. I found it quite funny at the time, but it’s the one picture that’s been ingrained in my mind and has served me well for some time now. It shows what people think success looks like versus what success really looks like. So, regardless of what the “mess” looks like in the middle, you can be encouraged that you’ll be successful in your life, and your failures are more of a stepping stone to get there.

Look on the bright side

Nobody wants to fail, but that doesn’t mean you should be afraid of failing either. Instead, just see it as one of the things that happens to everyone in life because it does. So, when you do fail, look on the bright side of the matter, and if you can’t find one, create one (delusion might just be the solution in this case). All that matters is that you create a positive mindset for yourself in order to keep striving because your negative mindset will only get you so far.