What If I Try… And Fail?

Don't shut down your choices!

Have you ever let the question, “What if I try, and fail?” stop you from attempting (or completing) a goal?  Instead of letting this question stop you, ask yourself instead, “What if I never try at all?”

A young woman I know comes from a tough background. She’s had to be physically tough to survive. While her background has prepared her well for a life of physical toughness on the streets, it hasn’t prepared her at all for the mental toughness necessary to survive and thrive in business.

She is currently in the process of applying for several different jobs. Every time she comes to a potential stumbling block, she allows it to stop her dead in her tracks.  “They’ll probably say ‘No’ because of this,” or “They won’t consider me because of that,” are the excuses she uses to justify quitting and trying something different. She has 5 different applications in process, but has finished none of them, causing her to actually fail at all of them, rather than simply being at the point of fearing failure in any one of them.

Have you ever let this type of thinking stop you in the pursuit of your career aspirations or personal dreams? Do you enable constant failure, rather than risk temporary setbacks on your way to permanent success?

I’ve fallen victim to this, too. At one point my husband encouraged me to apply for a Systems Analyst position. I almost didn’t “because I’d never done that before,” assuming I’d never be hired for that reason. He told me the skills I used in my current position were also necessary for the new position, so I should try.  I still balked.  Frustrated, he exclaimed, “Sandy! Just go for the interview; if you’re not right for the job, let THEM tell you that.  Don’t assume!”  (Sound familiar?)  So, I went for it, and guess what? My husband was right; I got the job!  Lesson learned – I no longer let assumptions stop me from trying something new.

Please keep this in mind: Many people would rather experience the hope that a dream could happen rather than risk the reality that it doesn’t. However, what they fail to realize is that, in the meantime, this causes them to consistently fall short of their dreams – always continuing to “hope” for them to happen but never actually achieving them.

Stop the cycle of assuming you know what’s going to happen, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy of failure in the process. Instead, begin a cycle of finding out what actually does happen by seeing each dream through to its conclusion.  You may not always reach the answer you desire… or you may just have to persist through many obstacles in order to reach your dreams.

Either way, you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing that the outcome is real – and not just an assumption manufactured in your mind that creates a false result.