08
JAN

Impossible Failure

MICHAEL W. JACKSON

January 8, 2018

I encourage everyone to go for big dreams because it is only in striving at this level do you harness the best within yourself.  Yet this brings up an interesting question.  Does going for a really big dream increase the probability of failure?  I do not believe going for big dreams increases the chance for failure but this is because I choose to look at failure in a different way.  Typically when we think of failure, we see it in terms of falling short of a desire result.  There is a target or an objective and you did not quite meet this objective, so you call this a failure.  Whatever the target or objective was, it is not an endpoint.  This is not the finality of your life.  There is so much more.  You did not reach or achieve your objective because the requirements for attainment are incomplete.  Think of it like tipping the scales of a balance.  Easy stuff does not require much effort for you to lift.  Place a heavy weight on the other side and it takes considerably more effort to lift the load.  When you have a really big dream, the load, weight or challenge on the other side of the balance is enormous.  In fact, if you step on your side with all your weight, the load does not move.  Why?  The requirements needed to lift the load and attain your dream are incomplete.  It order to attain your dream, you only need to add more to your side.  It seems simple enough. IT IS NOT EASY.  The biggest dreams require time, hard work and undaunted persistence.  You are necessary to achieve your dreams but to have the biggest dreams of your life, you must become a different person.  You become a different person by choosing to be a better person.  Develop yourself to be the BEST you can be.  Become stronger, become smarter, become faster, become whatever is necessary.  Add to yourself constantly.  Never stop growing.  Be a lifelong learner.  Be obsessed with self-improvement and personal development so that over the long term of your life, you can meet any challenge you may face in your life.

Continue this process of personal growth and you will not fail at anything.  Failure will be impossible for you.  How can I be so sure?  What I am about to say is one of the most powerful concepts you could come to understand in your life.  Here goes…you will not fail at anything because the universe will not allow it.  Development of yourself entails more than physical strength and intellectual genius.  You must develop your mind and spirit to where you not only seek to understand the nature of the universe but also to have a relationship with it.  When you grasp the concept that what you experience in life is blessing you all the time then you are on the fast track of achieving your dreams without failure.  How can this be you wonder?  It is said Thomas Edison failed 10,000 times before perfecting the electric light bulb.  There were not 10,000 failures; there were 10,000 attempts before getting it right.  Each time the experiment did not work, Mr. Edison made an adjustment and tried again.  Whatever you want to be whatever you want to do, you are not going to wake up one morning and “be there.”  The big dreams of your life are real and are processes that take time but during that time, you must put in whatever  life requires of you.  When you understand that getting your dream is a process and not an endpoint, it is easier to manage the lessons “life” teaches you along the way.  You will experience setbacks, just like an ice skater falls several times before perfecting a jump.  You get up and try again.  Realize something here.  When you fall down or experience a setback, there is something you need to learn from this.  Be receptive and willing to learn from your experiences positive and negative.  If something did not turn out the way you expected, ask yourself.  What can I learn from this?  Learn from what does not work as well as what does.  Make adjustments for actions which do not produce your desired result and repeat actions which give you the result you seek.  This is the foundation of excellence.

I have been making a case that failure is impossible and the universe will not allow you to fail.  However, it is possible to have a lifelong dream and still fall short of your expectations?  Unfortunately, the answer is yes.  I have to be honest about cases such as these.  Competition is an example of this.  The Van Cliburn International piano competition, the Olympics and the World Series in baseball are examples of competition where there will be a winner.  One was just a little bit better than the other.  If it was ever your dream to win one of these types of competitions, how do you resolve falling short on this dream?  I would say if you did not win such a competition, you did not fail.  Just to be in such competitions already represents the best of the best.  In this case, you have not failed even if you did not win the competition.  In order to compete on the Olympic stage or any world class competition requires that you give your best effort and work relentlessly to improve upon that.  It is a commitment you must make to yourself.  Giving your best has to be a promise you make to yourself every day.  As long as you keep this promise to yourself, you will experience excellence in your life and you will not fail in your dreams because this process always makes “your best” better.  In life we are not always going to rank number one because such scoring and evaluation is based on the judgment by others of the quality of your work.  However, let the standard by which you measure success or failure be the degree to which you have satisfied your promise to yourself to give your very BEST.