The Reinvention of Failure

Failure makes us a fool. It’s the idea of rejection, the concept, that makes us fearful. Getting rejected, an idea flops, you don’t get the job, the startup closes down, your writing gets zero views. It’s all-encompassing. The thought that somebody else might think bad of you cripples you beyond belief. It’s this blanket hanging over you, this illusion of what failure is, how bad it is, how life is never going to be the same if you fail. But here’s a question, is failure that bad. <h1>Failures are plenty</h1> I remember my most embarrassing moment. I was due to give a presentation in front of my whole university class. The thought of it didn’t make me that nervous. I’d given presentations before, and I was confident. My friend said to me “you’ll be fine, you’re great at presenting.” So I did what every overconfident person does. I didn’t prepare. Even now I can see myself in my dorm room, thirty minutes before my presentation, doing a run-through. It was a minute and a half. Oops. It was meant to be five minutes. I was short. Like really short. I practised again. Short again. Oh no. This is not good. But I didn’t have any time. I had to walk across campus and this is all I had. One minute thirty and that was it. I sat in the lecture hall, my left leg tapping. I didn’t have thoughts. I was just a bucket of nervous energy. Where had this come from, I didn’t worry about presentations… did I? The other groups went first. Presentation after presentation. They were good. I mean, really good. This one guy looked like he was so at home up in front of the crowd he could be mistaken for the lecturer. <a href="https://medium.com/curious/the-reinvention-of-failure-b0e3964b5e4c">Visit Now</a>