Failure is such a negative word. When said in any context it holds the ability to crush a spirit, crush innovation, and certainly crush progress.
I remember during my PhD, I felt like such a failure, I was not publishing enough. My experiments were not working a lot of the times, and I kept thinking I was still the young girl who did not do so well at exams. Mind you, I still graduated from good universities, but I felt like I was not good enough, that I was always going to fail at something. Fail at exams, fail at relationships, basically fail at this life.
But then someone said, "Focus on the process". I wish I understood what that meant at the time because I was struggling to be good enough for everyone else. Mission accomplished, I graduated with a PhD, published papers and went to the best jobs in academia, and you know what, I still felt like a failure. With every stumbling block, I felt like a failure. The last time I thought this was when for a second time, I didn't get the Marie Curie grant to stay in what I thought was going to be my home, Imperial College London.
The pain of feeling like I let everyone down was devastating, but the worse pain I felt was that I let my smile down. And that was the moment I changed my mindset. Well more like, I made a deal with myself, to never let my smile down. Which really means to find and learn new ways to deal with perceived failure.
In my new role, I have written 12 grants and only succeeded in getting 3. But I am still here, and I am still pushing. One of the ways this change of mindset was solidified came from surfing. I say, if a wave with all its beautiful brutality didn't really hurt me, nothing anyone says or does can worry me or make me feel like I'm not good enough or even a failure. Now here's the caveat, I am no spiritual guru, and this takes a lot of work to stay humble in the process. But the other option is to be in pain. So I chose the process. Also, I have many bruises from epic wipeouts and scars from ocean critters, but I still somehow get on the board and learn to shuffle my feet if stingrays are around. Â
So today, butterflies in my stomach as I re-read a failed grant application and try to take every comment and turn it into a better re-application. There is a chance that I will not get it again, but I feel like I have already won by not being afraid to look my 'failure' in the face and try again, try better, keep focusing on the process, and find little ways to keep smiling.