“All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become.” ~Buddha
You didn’t get the job. You couldn’t raise the money. You missed the deadline. You hired the wrong person.
You didn’t ask for help. You let someone you love down. You failed to plan in advance. You bit off more than you could chew. You forgot something important.
Worst of all, whatever the case, you set the stage for a million questions about what it means and what you should have done.
When you don’t do something you wanted to do, oftentimes your disappointment has less to do with the results you failed to create and everything to do with your interpretation of what that failure means. That you’re not talented enough. Or competent enough. Or confident enough. Or good enough in general.
The only way to change your reaction to failure is to challenge the beliefs that create it—those ideas about what failure means. And the best way to change those beliefs is to change the thoughts that shape them. (more…)
