subject: Embrace Your Defeats To Motivate Yourself Forward [print this page] No matter what you're trying to do in your life, at some point you're going to suffer setbacks and defeats. How you handle these defeats will make a big impact on your overall level of energy and motivation.
If you beat yourself up whenever you face a setback, you'll lose motivation. You'll have a hard time finding the drive to get back up and try again.
On the other hand, if you treat each and every defeat as a learning experience, you'll not only be able to move forward more easily, but you'll be less afraid of failing in the future.
==> How to Reduce Fear of Failure
The key to reducing fear of failure is simple: The less painful you make failure, the less you'll be afraid of failure in the future.
If every time you're faced with a difficult task you beat yourself up, the next time you're faced with the chance to do something risky, it's much harder to take the risky path. Why? Because you know that if you fail, you'll beat yourself up.
On the other hand, if you treat failure in a way that's not only not painful but actually enjoyable, you'll look forward to taking risks. You'll know that the backlash won't hurt you.
==> How to Develop a Positive Attitude Towards Failure
When Thomas Edison had tried 9,000 times to invent the electric lightbulb, he was asked whether or not he felt like a failure.
His response? No way. He had just figured out 9,000 ways not to make the lightbulb. He learned from his experiences and soon after created one of the most important inventions of his century.
The facts of what happened are not what matters. It's your attitude and mentality towards them that matters.
How do you respond to the challenges in life? Do you view yourself as a failure, or do you spring back with a positive view?
Here are a few positive ways you can frame failure in your life:
* As a learning experience. You've simply learned one way not to do something.
* As feedback. You went into the world with a hypothesis or belief. The world gave you feedback as to whether you were right or not.
* As a necessary step. If you know that most people need to go through 3 failed businesses before creating one successful one, when your business fails you can just treat it as a necessary step in the path to success.
* As personal growth. Look at how you've changed over the process of attempting to achieve something. Are you a different person as a result?
* As setup. Now that you've failed once at something, does that make it more likely you'll succeed the next time?
There are many, many different ways you can treat failure.
==> Reinforcing New Beliefs
Unfortunately, it's not as easy as just picking a belief and running with it. Changing your beliefs around something as ingrained as failure can take time.
Pick one attitude or mindset that you want to ingrain into your psyche. Every time you face a failure or setback, think of that attitude or mindset.
For example, let's say you wanted to treat failure as a learning experience. Every time you face failure, closely examined everything you learned. Be grateful for those lessons and use the experience to get yourself excited to try again.
Changing your beliefs around motivation can and will boost your motivation. It'll remove your fear to act and allow you to truly and wholeheartedly pursue your goals.
