Why So Many People Fail to Learn from Failure
Learning from failure is overrated. There I said it. But before you crucify me for going against the most common cliché in the self-help / personal growth genre of advice, let me tell you why.
To learn from failure, you must pay close attention to the details that led to the causes of failure and separate your ego from those causes of failure. Not only that, but you must also find wise counsel to help you reverse engineer those causes of failure into learning that leads to a transformational change.
This. Is. Not. Easy.
Thus, the reason why so many people fail to learn from failure and why learning from failure is overrated. Why focus on learning from failure so much when there is a better way….
Learning from success.
In fact, research from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business strongly supports that you learn more from success than failure. But not just any success. Success in the face of a significant chance of experiencing a meaningful failure.
It’s through the process of succeeding in the face of a significant challenge when you learn to embrace success habits such as grit, resilience, discipline, and delayed gratification. This is because success breeds success. What’s more, it’s far easier to learn to keep doing what you are doing than to change.
So, the next time you find yourself struggling to learn from failure flip the script. Focus on what challenges you’re overcoming successfully and learn from what you are doing in that area of your life. Then apply those lessons to the areas of your life in which you’re struggling.