inthedougout

Your story will be one about failure if you insist on defining it that way.  Those words sound harsh, and they are.  But the reality is that you are what you think you are.  Are you a failure?  Are you someone who's struggling through failure?  Are you someone down on their luck? Or did you decide to "flip the switch" and decide that the failures do not define you?   If you chose the latter, you made a good choice because the rest of your mind and body will follow.  Our concious thoughts shape unconcious and subconcious states and behaviors.  You know this.  You can absolutely imagine things for yourself - both good and bad.  They are as real as you want them to be.  You give the meaning and power to those thoughts in a way that can make them into not just a reality, but a way of life.   For better or for worse - that pendulum swings in both directions.  Negative thinking shapes negative outcomes and positive thi...

My body is f*cked. What's the best way to proceed?  Well, that's a tad complicated to answer - we're all snowflakes (translation: no, it's not that you're soft, but you are uniquely injured ). There aren't many worse feelings than knowing you are forever physically limited.  And if you fit into that category: I am sorry.  But here's the key: you cannot, and should not, feel sorry for yourself.  It beats the alternative (you know, not having a living, breathing body with flowing, pumping blood).   In this vein (pun intended), our goal is to use what we have.  It's to work with the hand we have been dealt.  It is to not stop at the first sign of danger - it is to see the danger, acknowledge it, and then move the fuck on.   You are not on this earth to sit still.  You are not on this earth to waste away.  You are not on this earth to do anything other than to inch closer to your potential. And so yes, there have been moments where...

Diagnosing the intersection of time and failure -  Failure comes in many forms. It can be the result of poor choices, lack of effort, or simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It can be a small setback, like a missed deadline, or a major catastrophe, like a failed business venture. Regardless of its scale, failure often carries a heavy emotional burden, bringing with it feelings of disappointment, regret, and even shame.    However, failure is not an end point. It is an opportunity for growth and learning. When we examine our failures with honesty and self-reflection, we can identify our mistakes, understand our weaknesses, and develop strategies for improvement. In this way, failure can be a catalyst for personal transformation, pushing us to become more resilient, resourceful, and ultimately, more successful.    What even is happenstance? - Happenstance, also known as serendipity or chance, is the occurrence of events by accident rather than design...

I don't know about you, but I really hate to fail.  I am willing to do almost anything to avoid failing.  I hate it.  I am willing to do things I otherwise wouldn't want to do, only if it means I can avoid failing at something.   It's not so much about not getting what I want, however.  I think, in isolation, I can grapple with that outcome and figure out what to do next. The thing we seem to be afraid of is failing in front of others.  We worry about what they'll think of us and our reputation.  Our reputation is our brand, after all. But maybe instead of thinking about this in terms of a binary "pass, fail" set of options, what if the reputation is a set of options surrounding what you do about failure.  And maybe you were putting entirely too much pressure on yourself to achieve one outcome over another.   And so that  is our struggle, our call to action.  Fail - fail to allow yourself to grow.  Fail - fail out of ...

This is officially a call to action: fail more. Do you ever feel like you're afraid to lose or fail?  Do you think that fear prevents you from doing things that you want to do? The answer to both of those questions - for nearly every segment of our population - is yes. They have been a resounding "yes" for me and for the vast majority of my life.  What's interesting is that, as a child, I was less fearful.  Part of that was knowing that I had some semblance of a support system to catch me when I fell.  My parents weren't always there for me - with all respect to them and their own struggles - but I knew there were certain teachers I could call upon if needed. When we get older, we become that trusted adult for others, but what happens when we still need those trusted adults and mentors in our life?  For me, I reached a point where the torch was handed off to me, but I was not done needing help, myself.   In the process, I tripped over myself figuring o...

The first chunk of my life was dictated for me.  I went to school and I was told what to do in school.  I got a job and I was told what to do at that job.  I went to college and I was told what to do in college.  I found a better job and I was told to do in that job.   My success in those different contexts was some milestone, goal, or achievement that was given to me by those different contexts.  I didn't have to think about what the goal was - it was merely given to me.  In some sense, that's great - I appreciate that someone was training me. But the problem is that no one told me that I was merely being trained.  Without necessary communication and context, I kept drifting through the days thinking another goal or milestone would magically appear. Well, it didn't.  And it took me a few years to figure this out - more than I'd like.   What did I learn in the process? That you must set those goals for yourself - even if those ...

An ode to failure: Roses are red, violets are blue,  I face-planted hard, my pain was due.  My grand visions, gone and unjust,  My carefully laid plans, turned entirely to dust. The truth: we must learn to love failure.  If you don't love failure, you most certainly won't love the success that comes in the second part of your story.  As you figure out what it is you love, why not love all of it?

Have you ever thought that failure is really just a matter of being in the wrong place at the wrong time?  To a certain extent, I think there's a lot of truth to that, but there's a ton to unpack with that.  If we fail because we were in the wrong place at the wrong time, does it mean that everything else was "right?"  Probably not.  Blaming things on the circumstances may blind us to defects or deficiencies in our own process and state of being.  What does that mean?  It means don't blame some outside force for your circumstance - if you failed, you failed.  It does not matter when it happened.  Sure, you could have had some bad luck but blaming luck will not give you the kick-in-the-ass that you need to get that ass in gear.  Let's dig in a little bit. Some people call life a canvass. As you paint with your brush, sometimes the bristles of the brush do exactly as you want.  Other times, the brush wreaks havoc - it operates almost as if...

I have no doubt that, every day, you are bombarded with decisions that force you to think about who to disappoint, who to upset, and who to please. It's not that you go out of your way to think about these things, but you realize that no matter what you do, there will be somebody affected.  Someone will be upset, someone will be disappointed, and maybe (though not likely to be you), someone will be pleased.  If you couldn't tell by now, this is going to be a lesson in better decision-making.  And in doing so, we are going to shed some baggage that we have accumulated along the way. If you have never heard of the term "analysis paralysis," it essentially means being frozen and unable to make a decision.  We spin the different possibilities endlessly until we can't figure out one option from another.  Often, we have difficulty making decisions not because of the decision to be made, but how we think the decision will impact certain people.   We do this m...

 This is a bit of a detour from our usual programming, but a worthwhile journey - I promise. Much of the reason I write about failure is that it's a condition of loneliness.  Failure feels - and is - very, very personal.   Because of how personal it is, failure feels unique to you and only you.  Because of that, failure is really just an expression of loneliness.  One of the reasons it feels so painful is because we feel alone, and potentially lost, in our feelings.  That's not a great place to be. Because of that experience, I have decided to write this book.  I am aware that one day, I won't be on this earth.  The thought depresses the hell out of me, but I've tried to not dwell.  We are human and this is, after all, the human existence (lifecycles of birth, living, and death).   That said, while I am on this damn earth, I will make the most of it.  One of the ways I have decided to make the most of it is by writing this...

 In the middle of my career, I kept running into roadblocks, potholes, and speedbumps.  To be clear, I wasn't really doing anything differently than I had done in the past 5 years.  From a psychological perspective, I sort of expected my continued hard work and commitment to just show up later as being rewarded.  Well, I am here to tell you that it was not.  You already knew that because you're probably a lot like me.  You've been doing the same thing - possibly very well - for the past several years and just not getting through that barrier.   The beginning of my career was fun.  Things came easy.  I had tasks and milestones.  I was a technical person.  I did technical things and I did them well.  The "elder" crew loved my willingness to take on tasks and crush them.  Little did I realize, that elder crew was likely assigning me small little tasks that were beneficial to them in their larger scheme project (put a pin...

Time for a pop quiz: how did you fail today?  What sucked today?  And what did you do about it? Failure for me, today, was having a migraine strike and figuring out what to do about it.  I'm the type of person that doesn't like to stop - for anything, not even a migraine.  I get frustrated by inactivity and not being productive.  Not because I am part of some machine that has brainwashed or forced me to work when I am not my best.  It's because I am too damn proud.  And it's possible that my pride and stubbornness was my failure for today. Sometimes our body provides the signal our brain is ignoring.   The science is either emerging or simply becoming more clear, but there is a connection between the mind and body.  That connection is the vessel for communicating all sorts of things - happiness, distress, contentment, and so forth.  The body is an excellent teacher, if we let it. There's a fine line between ignoring the warning ligh...

I often like to ruminate.  I find it sort of fun, kind of like a sick, tortured hobby.  I sometimes take ideas and run them into the ground.  And yes, sometimes these are good ideas and other times, bad ideas.   Rumination most often fails to end well, however.  Rumination can quickly turn into unbounded worry.  And endless worry wreaks havoc on your mental state, physical state, and emotional state.  We always need to be mindful of pushing and pulling the different levers... such as "let yourself feel the emotion," but let's be realistic: not for too long. When I find myself in a "worry spiral," it usually takes me a few moments, or days, before I catch myself and realize this incredibly helpful mantra: do not worry alone.   In that same vein, why fail alone? Tonight, at the dinner table, my wife put this idea into practice.  She asked each of us to describe "how did we fail today?"  This was, of course, not an invitation for ...

The reason I give a shit about failure is that we all fail.  It is a fact of human life.  And if we all fail, what are we supposed to do with all of this failure that's been piling up?  For me, personally, I didn't know what to do with all of the failure.  It sat and sat and  sat.  Eventually, it began affecting my ability to perform at a level I'm comfortable with (and to be clear, when I am not performing at a high level, I get this existential itch that bothers the hell out of me). A brief detour: a paradox is a statement or situation that seems to contradict itself or go against common sense.   Returning to the point: failure, at least the way we view it, is a bit of a paradox.  That's because failure is most typically experienced as something negative (i.e., the "oh man, that sucks" situation).  By letting that be the end of the story, we are depriving ourselves of a powerful catalyst for developing and growth.  Bumpy roads, ef...

The funny thing about failure is that people are rarely remembered solely  for their failures.  Most observers may not even realize that someone has even endured a particular amount of failure. One of the best examples of this is Abraham Lincoln.  Did Abraham Lincoln really lose 8 elections?  Did you even know that Abraham Lincoln lost 8 elections?  What's really fascinating about Abraham Lincoln is that the dude failed far more than he succeeded.  According to abrahamlincolnonline.org , the guy persisted through what I'd perceive to be a ridiculous amount of failure.  Enough failure to make most of us curl up into a ball and hide in the closet.  Let's run through what happened to him, though briefly, of course.   Between 1832 and 1858, he lost his job, had a failed business, had a nervous breakdown, was defeated for speaker, had a failed bid for Congress, eventually lost a re-nomination, was rejected for land officer, was defeated for U...

In a family, failure is abound.  It going be on a big scale, of course, but most practically, it exists on a micro-scale. To a toddler, maybe you failed by pouring the cereal incorrectly (yes, there is such a thing).  Maybe to a 3-year-old, you light the birthday cake too soon (yes, there is such a thing).  Maybe to your middle-schooler, your screen time protections backfired (yes, there is such a thing).  Maybe you ordered the wrong meal, or item, and brought your family a version less, or different, than they expected. The fact is that these circumstances have a way of accumulating throughout the day... and with those failures, so does our reaction to those events.  Are we throwing pity parties?  Or are we owning it and moving forward?  That responsive, reactive energy has a lot to do with our mental state going into the next micro battle.  The thing is ... i t doesn't always have to be fixed right away.   A delay isn't a bad thing.  E...

Let me guess - you probably spent a ton of money on Thanksgiving items, food, decorations, and so forth.  You may have even dropped a pretty coin to travel. Did the turkey burn?  Did it dry out?   Failed Thanksgiving? Keep it simple and make a new tradition.  Do something wild.  A few ideas - 1)  Thanksgiving Lasagna - you can take this in a few different ways.  You could go traditional (e.g., Italian) or a modern twist (e.g., Thanksgiving foods baked as a lasagna). 2)  McDonald's - no joke.  Just go get some burgers.  I'm usually a healthy dude, but when crisis hits, McDonald's is outstanding.  Those golden arches bring joy.  Where is the nearest McDonald's?  May as well have it handy. 3)  Peanut butter and jelly - you may think this is a joke, but it's not.  There's little more comforting to me than a simple peanut butter and jelly sandwich.  How to make it?  Make it the way you want to make i...

A typical response to failure is to cringe, hide, or bury it.  And to be clear, there is nothing wrong with that.  Those responses are more than healthy. But what if we decided to say thank you to our failure instead of our otherwise automatic, programed response of cringing into a shell of ourselves?   There may be a case that doing the opposite could help: 'Doing the opposite' is a really effective, straightforward strategy to change your emotional state that can be difficult to put into action. This technique involves doing the opposite of whatever behaviors you normally perform due to painful or negative emotions. For this Thanksgiving, I am trying to flip the script completely.  What if we run towards the failure instead of running away from it?  What if we can find what we're thankful for instead of resisting the failure?  What if the failure is there for a reason?  What if we fail to listen to the failure? In general, this is about expandi...

  This one is about letting go and, specifically, learning how  to let go. This lesson comes courtesy of Aliza Grace - thank you .  The imagery below applies mostly to grief, but the feelings and grief and failure share a good deal of overlap.  To be clear - I am by no means equating failure and grief.  I just believe that "lower case" grief can be "grieving" a situation or scenario - often re-playing a failure of yours, over and over in your head.  "Upper case" grief is a whole other ball of wax and maybe we talk about the intersection between failed opportunities and lost loved ones (a scenario that I unfortunately have too much experience with). So what does this mean?  This imagery means something significant to me:  failure is relative to your growth and experiences.  When we allow the failure to represent a significant share of our identity, then it will seem like there is little room for anything else. However, as we grow and progress,...

Have you ever woken up with that odd tightness in your chest?  That feeling that gnaws at you, tugs at every fiber and strand of your day? That happens to all of us - frankly.  It gives us a fantastic choice: how will we cope and how will we respond? A few thoughts when that does come up: 1)  Wallow a bit, it's ok.  Those feelings are trying to tell you something, so why not listen?  It's okay to ruminate and wallow for a bit, so long as you're aware of being in those cycles. 2)  If you are not aware, then dust off the coping mechanisms.  It takes a bit of practice to know that you're in the spiral of emotions trying to take you down.  We have to be able to catch ourselves - the idea is to catch yourself as often as possible, but, of course, without judgment or attribution.  See the tension.  See the angst.  Go on - just feel it, see it, acknowledge it.  You may even feel a slight bit of relief just acknowledging that it's ther...