Let talk about failure

failures comic

Life has surprising twists and turns, but as long as we face it with courage and hope we are never a failure.

It is natural and easy for someone to feel like a failure because they didn’t get the result that they wanted in life. Perhaps things didn’t turn out in their personal life like they wanted or they don’t have the goals that they set for themselves met.

What I have learned in life is that no matter how many challenges someone has, things can change. People can turn around from difficult paths. Even better we can avoid going down paths that don’t help us or others.

Take me for instance. In the past, I wanted certain paths for my life to follow. Things didn’t work out and those goals weren’t achieved. However, something even greater happened. I may not have the financial success of others, but I have grown in my ability to be empathic, sensitive, and aware of others. Every difficulty that I have faced has opened my eyes and heart to the challenges that people have. No matter what happens to me, I know that I will never suffer like many have and continue to suffer. I consider myself extremely fortunate no matter what happens in my life.

This is not me trying to deny reality. I know for example from being friends with a blind man, that you can actually be happier by not seeing. You don’t need the vision to be happy and just seeing might actually cause us more unhappiness. I know from working with people with abilities that you don’t need intelligence to be a good person. You don’t need social connections to feel love. You don’t need a family to feel special and safe. If you have these things great, but many things we think we need we don’t. We only truly need one person to believe in us, and if no one else believes in us it must be ourselves.

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Life is both an exercise in learning what we don’t need and recognizing what we do need.