Marcy, a new client of mine, recently failed an exam (by two points) that she took in order to become licensed as a Certified Social Worker in New York State. While understandably disappointed, Marcy, unfortunately responded by becoming severely self-critical and questioned whether or not she had the ‘right stuff’ to become a mental health professional; a career for which she had been preparing since college. Sadly, the lesson Marcy came away with was “I guess I’m just not smart enough to pass an exam like this. Maybe I’m not cut out to be a mental health professional.”
The right lesson would have sounded more like this: “Okay, I blew this exam. I guess I’ll have to work harder to prepare for the next one and figure out a way to do better. After all, I only need two more points. These things happen, I’ll do better next time.” One of the main reasons people may only suffer, rather than also benefit from their mistakes or failures, is that they turn against themselves when such experiences occur, rather than learning something that will help them grow or change.
A major consequence for some people when they make a mistake or fail in some way is to focus only on self-critical feelings that can lead to sadness or depression. This may make it much more difficult to have the confidence to get back into the situation in which they experienced problems. Sometimes self-flagellation is a way to make a preemptive strike against oneself before anyone else does. The important point here is this: If you must, hate the fact that you made a mistake or endured a failure, but don’t hate yourself for having done so.
Most of us have been through experiences where we found it difficult to tolerate the frustration of learning something new, where mistakes and failure are an unavoidable part of the process. This would explain why so many adults never learned to ride a bicycle or swim and why so many youngsters spent six days, rather than six years, in Little League baseball.
Perhaps the most useful lesson to be learned from the experience of failure is to take something of value with you that can be helpful in dealing with situations to be encountered in the future. Tolerating frustration and delaying gratification in the process of learning new things and striving for excellence are the hallmarks of a healthy, rational, and potentially successful child or adult.
