What’s up, GOOD PEOPLES.

After my last post, I was visited by the esteemed Real Estate Investor and Blogger from the Bluegrass State, Sharon Vornholt!

I recognized her name from my buddy Shannon Bynes’ Good Faith Investing blog, so I was quite excited to have earned a comment from Sharon.

My first visit to Sharon’s web site landed me here:

Sharon Vornholt - Success and Failure Are Both Good

I loved this post.  So I commented on it, and I’m expanding on my comment here!

Sharon, I agree about the unappreciated value of FAILURE.

Ironically, I undertook a project to write an eBook titled “WE WANT YOU TO FAIL“, in 2009.
It was a collaborative effort.
And we never got the book out of the door. LOL! (We… failed?)

(Yes, failure, especially ironic failure, does hurt. OUCH.)

I will get that book out, one way or another.

But I learned a lot about why it failed.

• Collaborative projects can be challenging for various reasons
• Leadership by democracy usually doesn’t work.  The buck needs to stop with one person
• Every great undertaking needs a strong enough WHY to get you through the tough times
• It’s important to START great undertakings.  But it’s even more important to FINISH them.

and so on.

All of these read as common sense.

But common sense isn’t that common.

Because while most people logically understand common sense,

Unless they’ve made the mistakes themselves,

Common sense is no more than JUST WORDS.

Okay…  so in some cases, common sense is pretty obvious… except for the most peculiar among us.

Surely you don't need to make this mistake personally, to know this is dumb?

(-ex- McDonald’s Coffee is HOT. Duh.)

I’ve come to appreciate failure a lot more, as a parent.

I want my two sons (ages 3 and 6 months) to fail.

FAIL EARLY, AND FAIL OFTEN, as they say in the open source software world. ha ha!

Imagine:

• If my 6 month old doesn’t fall flat  several times, he won’t learn to crawl.
• If he doesn’t learn to crawl, he’ll never learn to walk.
• If he never stumbles when he walks, he won’t be much of a runner.
• And if he never falls and scrapes his knee while running, he’ll never know how fast he can actually go.

Why??

Parents, you wouldn’t do this to your infant children, would you? LOL!

So why do we have such an aversion for failing / falling, that we:

• Pad up,
• Avoid,
• Postpone,
• Wander around,
• Paralyze ourselves with analysis,

And so on?

All to avoid that momentary pain that is necessary to gain a new skill, or reach a new peak?

Next time you’re feeling intimidated about potential failure,

picture yourself as a baby burger.

Without failure, there is no growth.

Without failure, you are a Baby Burger.

Go ahead – skin your knee.  You’ll live to tell the tale.  And be better for it.

“Those who try, fall.

But those who quit, FAIL.”

– Bolaji Oyejide, 2010

What’s your take on FAILURE?

Bonus:

If you want to get a really good perspective on failure, visit DESPAIR.COM.
(WARNING: You’ll need a self-deprecating sense of humor to appreciate these:)