Choosing Failure

Doing more of the same won't change the outcome. If you keep choosing failure, you keep failing.

Life is a series of choices and consequences. We get to choose our choices, but the consequences of our life automatically follow those choices. The outcomes of our lives are a direct result of the thoughts we think and the actions we take.

We live in a world today where everyone wants to claim victimhood. This crazy cultural phenomenon that wants to blame the lack of opportunity, money, fame, fortune, or success on an external factor ignores the fundamental law of choices and consequences. It's easier to admit something is wrong with society, or point the blame at other people, rather than facing the person we see in the mirror and questioning the choices we are making.

Sadly, far too many people are choosing failure over success.

And it doesn't have to be that way.

But it all comes down to one thing... a choice.

Here is a powerful statement I want to share to set up today's thoughts on the Power of Choice:

What you CHOOSE reveals itself in your success, or the lack thereof.

Of all of the things we do not have control over in life, our thoughts are the one thing we can control. Yet far too many people either choose not to think, or they choose to think and act upon thoughts that do not move them toward achievement, fulfillment, and true success in life.

Every day, you and I have the opportunity to choose thoughts that serve us well and move us forward on our personal growth journey to become better at who we are and what we do. However, you have only to look around you at the growing number of people who refuse to take personal responsibility for their actions and do the things necessary to grow, and simply point the finger at others.

It's always easier to blame other people, or lean into victimhood, rather than acknowledge the consequences of life you are experiencing are a result of the choices you have made.

And, it's easier to choose failure than success.

In the Bible, the apostle Paul made it a point as he was writing to a group of young believers to remind them that the mistakes of the past had been documented so future generations would learn from the failure of others and not repeat it. Paul was highlighting an often forgotten truth, and that is that we can learn from the past so we can make better choices that avoid undesirable consequences.

Growing up as a young man, I only had to touch a boiling pot of water on the stove one time to learn never to do that again. This is a fundamental law of success, learning from our mistakes.

If you've ever done that, or something similar, I'm sure you can relate.

But here's the problem, people are not learning from their mistakes. Society as a whole is trying to remove the consequences of making poor choices.  Growing up, we had a grading system in school that rewarded merit and achievement. Everyone was held to the same standard.  Today, we lower the standards, remove the grading system, and de-incentivize learning.

As a result, we are teaching a generation of students to choose failure by default.

What gets rewarded gets repeated.

This is a phrase I've heard one of my mentors, Tony Robbins, consistently say throughout his career. It is a simple but profound truth. What society is doing to people today is de-incentivizing success and what is required to achieve it. It has chosen to incentivize and reward bad thinking and bad behavior.

Rather than helping struggling kids learn to read, write, and become critical thinkers who think for themselves, we remove the tried and tested standards that challenge individuals to rise to their full potential and step into the greatness of who they are. Society today is more focused on conformity, teaching people what to think, and removing the incentives that reward those individuals that put in the time and effort to become Black Belt Masters at who they are and what they do.

We defund police, decriminalize drugs, and refuse to enforce the laws that are on the books to protect the welfare and well-being of individuals and the community as a whole. As a result of soft-on-crime policies, any of our major cities have become something out of a post-apocalyptic movie where everyone acts with impunity, with no regard for the welfare and safety of others.

When you reward bad thinking and bad behavior, you get more of it.

All of this is teaching people to choose failure.

But it's easier to say, “It's not my fault.” than it is to take personal responsibility for your choices.

Truth hurts, but it needs to be heard.

You cannot rise to your full potential without accepting personal responsibility for the thoughts you think and the choices you make. Pointing the finger at others, or blaming your race, color, religion, creed, or national origin is more often than not an excuse rather than a reality. 

People have been victimized throughout human history, but successful people have always found a way to rise above victimization to step into the greatness of who they are. There will always be victims in the world, those who choose failure over success, but you do not have to be one of those people.

Let me give you an example of the thoughts you and I think every day that are causing us to either choose success or failure for ourselves. 

Every day, you and I can choose to see the proverbial glass as half empty or half full. If you see a half-full glass, you begin to focus on what you have and all that you can do with it. If you see the glass as half empty, your focus is on what you do not have and how you are limited.

One is a vision of abundance and success; the other is a vision of scarcity and lack.

Here's another one. Every day you and I get to choose whether we will lead ourselves well and make good choices, focusing on becoming a better version of who we are than we were the day before.  Or, we can choose to stay where we are, as we are, thinking the same thoughts and making the same choices that lead to the same limited outcomes and opportunities for the rest of our lives.

One is a vision of abundance and success; the other is a vision of scarcity and lack.

You and I are choosing success are choosing failure every day.

The thoughts we think, and the corresponding choices we make, are either moving us forward, leaving us where we are, or worse, they are causing us to go backward.  When we choose to learn, grow, and mature, daily focusing on becoming better at who we are and what we do we are consciously making the choice to be successful over time.

This requires you and I to be intentional about how we are living our lives. It requires that we examine the thoughts we are thinking and the choices we are making and evaluate the consequences that we will experience as a result. When we are intentional about our thinking and our choosing, we are framing our outcomes to be success focused.

But choosing failure is easy. Little or no work is required.

We simply choose not to do the things that are required to learn, grow, and mature, and we elect to stay where we are, as we are, stuck in a mediocre, lackluster existence that never brings true fulfillment, lasting satisfaction, and the success in life that deep down we crave.

Carly Fiorina, the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard, says, “The status quo has great power, but leaders challenged the status quo to change things for the better.”

There is a LOT of truth in that statement.

Living a status quo life is choosing failure. Because like a plant, if you're not growing, you're starting to rot. But the world is not going to choose success for you, and like a plant, you have to keep taking your roots deeper into the soil and continually feeding yourself what is necessary for your personal growth and development.

One has only to observe nature to see the circle of life before us. Creation itself, nature, is in a constant process of growth and change. So why do we think it's any different for us? Why do we believe we can stay the same and not change?

Sometimes we succeed, and sometimes we don't.

When we don't, this is failure.

The question you and I must answer is this, “What do I do with this?”

So why do we choose failure? 

Let me give your four reasons.

1.       We have all failed at one time or another. It's part of the human existence. We will not always be successful at everything we do; however, failure, rightly used, helps us to learn, grow, and improve.

2.       When we don't learn failure’s lesson, we are doomed to repeat that same mistake (or one very similar) in the future.  History is full of stories of men and women who failed, refused to learn the lesson of failure, and kept choosing failure again and again.

3.       If we experience enough failure in life, we come to expect failure.  

4.       When we expect failure, we begin to see ourselves as failures, and our subconscious mind continually works to bring more failure into our lives.

The end result, we accept failure as the inevitable conclusion of our lives and we simply choose to embrace it. We don't learn the lessons, we don't recognize the patterns, and we fail to see the failed consequences of our lives are symptoms of a belief system that has embraced failure.

Let me give you a visual of choosing success or failure.

I had the opportunity a few years ago to travel to Alaska on a cruise. While I was there, I had an opportunity to witness the salmon run. Thousands of salmon, all fighting their way against the current, with one aim and one goal of getting back to the nesting grounds where they were birthed. The water was cold and the current was strong.

The salmon had a choice. They could choose to keep moving forward, fighting against the pressures of life that were attempting to hold them back from achieving their goal. Or, they could simply choose to yield to the current and allow the river to take them back to the ocean.

One choice is success, and the perpetuation of their species. The other choice is failure, simply allowing life to dictate where they would go and what they would do.

Let me leave you with this…

Choosing failure is easy. It's a form of ignorance and denial. We make excuses, we point fingers, and we've refused to take personal responsibility long enough that we become accustomed to failure. And once we have accepted failure as a lifestyle, it becomes natural for us to live in that state.

Failure becomes the new normal.

And once we believe that we are failures, our subconscious mind begins to filter any thoughts or information to the contrary that would cause us to see ourselves as anything other than a failure.

Now it's even easier to point the finger at others, our blame our circumstances or our situation, rather than choosing to do what is necessary to rise above our adversities and step into the full potential of who we are, and become a Black Belt Master of our lives.

It's like we've put ourselves in an episode of the Twilight Zone where we find ourselves trapped in a maze and we intentionally keep walking past the exit signs. Choosing to remain trapped inside.

John Keats once said, “Failure is, in a sense, a highway to success.”  Everyone fails, but not everyone learns. Those who learn, and keep learning, find themselves on the highway to success and ultimately arrive at their destination.

Remember, doing more of the same won't change the outcome. If you keep choosing failure, you keep failing.

So, here's the key. 

We can't always change what life brings to us, but we can change how we respond to it. You and I get to choose our choices, and if we make better choices we experience better outcomes. We experience less failure, and we experience more success.