When “Failure” Wins, You Lose

Once upon a time, failure was really looked upon as an event, and only an event. It clocked in as a fleeting moment in time. It was marked by impermanence; looked at as a mere bump in the road. One was said to have made a failure.

Today, however, in the ever escalating age of instant gratification, failure has taken on a radically different meaning. It now leaves an indelible mark, staining the individual like an unwanted tattoo. It has a draconian, permanent type of feel to it. Failing has become the end of the story; an insidious label (as in you are a failure) which poisons the mind and follows the individual like a shadow.

This cosmic shift in perception has caused fear (as in fear of failing) and unhappiness to reign. It has caused people to give up dreams, to forgo initiatives and to worship the status quo of life. It has provided untold millions excuses for not getting the job done. Safety has become the new elixir. Not to try risks nothing. Attempting to achieve risks everything. And today it is better to play it safe than risk attaining a new moniker of Failure. The Sword of Damocles is lifted whenever you embrace the fail-safe protection of giving up.

Many bemoan the fact that in war, lives are lost and the promises of achievement of so many are likewise snuffed out. The thinking goes that within those tens of millions of lives there lived the seed of great discoveries; great thoughts; needed viewpoints that never got expressed. Just as there is no difference between the person who can’t read and the person that won’t read there is no difference between the person who won’t even try and the person whose life ended too early. This is the saddest commentary of all.