Global Leadership Incentive

It is a classic coaching phrase we tell others and even ourselves when faced with challenges and situations throughout our lives. Often can it be a new undertaking, such as a new job or a challenge we are faced with that has deep emotional meaning to us. As far as coaching phrases go like many others its straight to the point, meant to be understood and felt. And whenever a situation occurs when you feel that anxious feeling that this situation is so important to you that you trick yourself into thinking you are scared… Then reminding yourself of that should calm you and help you focus. Now, if you are the person that is capable of brushing things off more easily then perhaps the quick reminder to just “not be afraid to fail” works just fine for you. However if we break down what is actually being said it can be we can see that although it is an effective way to encourage yourself, that combination of words could be argued and deemed psychologically counter effective. Lets take a closer look:

Don’t be afraid to fail. Off the bat the first word is counter intuitive, especially when your challenge or situation requires action. Telling yourself to not be something or feel something at a time of decision making or performance creates hesitation. It is time to do.

Don’t be afraid to fail. Planting a word like afraid into your brain prior to or during performance I think we can all agree is foolish. For a quick exercise, try telling yourself to not be a afraid multiple times over and over, then take notice to how you feel. The very word itself can make you afraid.

“Failure is the mother of success.”

– Ancient Chinese Proverb

What is failure?

Perhaps it is wise to look at what we are really are afraid of when it comes to failing. Failing is not just an event that was doomed upon you. It is more so a series of mistakes that make it so, therefore it stands to reason that this sudden event called failure is within your control. Now there are numerous ways we experience failure such as, your team losing, losing out on a deal, not getting that audition, unable to hold a promise, and so on and so forth. All different of course but they all share the same series of mistakes that lead you there. So what do we do when we have failed? If what lead you there truly are mistakes, being that you truly cared about this act so much that it made you afraid, and your effort and intentions were in the right place then the next step becomes to learn from your mistakes. That last part is in italics because just like the phrase this blog post is talking about, it is what I like to call an “antiquated coaching phrase that needs to be understood” or just call it an antiquated coaching phrase. Because let’s be honest, how many times have you heard these phrases being told to you. However it is true that you should review your mistakes post-failure, because that is how you learn.

So what are we afraid of? Learning? Learning so next time you are in a similar situation, you will be more prepared and hopefully succeed? No we all want to get better and succeed in whatever it is that we do. Michael Jordan said that he missed over 9000 shots in his career and that he failed over and over, but that is the reason why he was successful as he puts it. All of those missed shots and failures gave Michael Jordan room to learn and grow. He went back to practice and worked on his shortcomings until they became strengths. To reiterate that Thomas Edison famously said “I have not failed. I have just found 10,000 ways that wont work.”

Failure in one persons life may be a success in another persons life. The event that you personally consider a failure, someone else might dream of having that very opportunity to be in, and if so fail – to them it might be a win. Perspective is important to remember when one is winning and losing.

Life is not a zero-sum game

It is easy to know who failed and who succeeded in a basketball game. One team wins and the other loses. Easy. Zero-sum games puts our competitive mind at the forefront and numbers decide who is the victor. We surround ourselves with these games because they are exciting and who doesn’t enjoy winning? What is not a zero-sum game is life in itself. Nobody wins and loses at life. The richest man in the world today, might not be the richest tomorrow. Your neighbors house that you subjectively think is nicer than yours might flood next week and perish. There is no final whistle in life other than death itself. In todays world with social media and entertainment, seeing someone have more followers for example than yourself may feel like a failure. Or seeing that neighbor whose house you envy post lavish photos and getting the perfect reactions from his many more followers might make you feel like you are not succeeding.

Perfection

You might say “But I am a perfectionist, unless it feels perfect to me I have failed.” Calling yourself a perfectionist I would argue sounds a lot better to say to people than it is identifying as one. What CEO doesn’t want to hear that their potential new hire is a “perfectionist”? It sounds so good, so motivating and driven that you will not stop until your job is perfect, but perfect to whom? And what does it mean? As defined below by its origin:

Perfect stems from the Latin word perfectus meaning completed. Can you as a person, employee, athlete, manager or leader truly be complete? So complete that there is nothing else for you to learn? Implying that you never fail, therefore never learn. My guess is no because then you would be the first of your kind and we would probably have to redefine what a human is, for we as humans are certainly not perfect.

So what then is perfection? There is subjective and objective perfection. For example, I might think that “The Creation of Adam” by Michaelangelo in the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel is perfect. In my subjective opinion. However the tourist next to me might not. Another example of subjective opinion could be the song by Led Zeppelin “Stairway to heaven” a piece of music that I find subjectively perfect. So perfect that when I listen to it, the composition gives me goosebumps and a feeling of completeness. Once again, you reading this might think that it is the worst song you have ever heard. To which I would indulge into conversation and debate as to why you don’t feel the way I do, but none of us will be wrong. We are just two different people with different subjective opinions on what the perfect song is.

Did Michaelangelo back in year 1512 while painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel think to himself “I hope that an amateur blogger 513 years from now thinks that this art is perfect!” Seems a bit silly. I would argue that it was more along the lines of how Jimmy Page, the guitarist of Led Zeppelin explains the process of how “Stairway To Heaven” came to life. As he describes in the video below “The running order from beginning to the end, was sort of mapped out” then he continues “Everything is starting to open up on this map, on this journey through. All of this was planned, it wasn’t just an accident… Sort of by design”

Not once does Jimmy Page talk about achieving some form of perfection while creating this piece of music. There is a creative and emotional idea that keeps opening up throughout its meticulous planning. If only it was possible to get both Michaelangelo and Jimmy Page in a room and listen to them talk about their art…

Onto objective perfection, in your math test you scored 100%, without error, A+. That would be considered objective perfection because there is a criteria within the context of the test and your perfect score is defined by answering all the questions correctly. Now if your soccer team wins a game 3-0 were you perfect? In the statistical sense, yes you were perfect by not allowing any goals. But could you have scored more goals? Were mistakes made throughout the match? Most likely yes to the former and the latter. Neither the team nor the individual had a perfect game. So can you, the human being, be perfect in a zero-sum game? Subjectively by your grandma who always thinks that you are perfect, yes. But you knowing well that there is always something to work on and new heights to reach within the system of your activity or profession. Therefore you are not perfect because perfection within the sense that you see it is in reality fictional. There is no definition for that type of perfection. Perhaps the proper definition would be illusion?

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit”

– Aristotle

Excellence vs. Perfection

Perfection is a word that I think we have abused and it has since lost its value or understanding. It can be difficult to accept that one is not in reality perfect, or that life itself is not perfect or ever will be. The answer lies in the acceptance of that, which is a key word in how we are eventually going to rephrase the headline of this blog post. The closest thing we can get to the feeling of perfection would be excellence.

Excellence as defined above means “the quality of being outstanding or extremely good” or from its latin origin “surpass”. Once again is there no talk of perfection. Which brings us to a saying that you have also probably heard one too many times in your life and career but that is helpful to understand in what we are talking about. Yes you guessed it, strive for excellence. Is it perfect? No but it is the closest thing to that illusionary perfection as we can come.

It is the actual striving in the striving for excellence that matters. That is the journey that you are on where you know that perfection is not real and rather than being afraid to fail…

You accept the possibility of making mistakes.

From one persons perspective,

Respectfully,

GLI