The Psychology of your 20s - 345. How to fall in love with failure
Episode Date: October 21, 2025We think of failure as a terrible thing or something to be avoided. But when you learn to fall in love with failure, a whole new level of growth occurs that will have you seeing progress faster than e...ver. In our 20s, the so called failure-decade, we talk about how you can learn to fail, including: The reasons we fear failure Why our definition of success is inaccurate and socially conditioned The relationship successful people have with success Why grit matters more than IQ Why your fear of failure is keeping you behind 5 ways to ritualise failure in your daily life + more Listen now to change your entire mindset towards setbacks! ORDER MY BOOK Follow Jemma on Instagram: @jemmasbeg Follow the podcast on Instagram: @thatpsychologypodcast For business: psychologyofyour20s@gmail.com The Psychology of your 20s is not a substitute for professional mental health help. If you are struggling, distressed or require personalised advice, please reach out to your doctor or a licensed psychologist. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
This is an I-Heart podcast.
Guaranteed Human.
Hey, what's good, y'all?
You're listening to Learn the Hardway with your favorite therapist and host Kear Games.
This space is about black men's experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere, but you're having them with a licensed professional who knows what he's doing.
How many men carry a suit or armor.
It signals to the world that you not to be played with.
And just because you have the capability that does not mean that you need to, listen to learn.
the hard way on the AHA radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins.
But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax.
You doctored this particular test twice in so much, correct?
I doctored the test ones.
It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern.
Two more men who'd been through the same thing.
Greg Gillespie and Michael Mancini.
My mind was blown.
I'm Stephanie Young.
This is Love Trapped.
Laura, Scottsdale Police.
As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences.
Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
2%.
That's the number of people who take the stairs when there is also an escalator available.
I'm Michael Easter.
And on my podcast, 2%.
I break down the science of mental toughness, fitness, and building resilience in our strange modern world.
yourself through some hardships, and you will come out on the other side a happier, more
fulfilled, healthier person. Listen to 2%. That's TWA percent on the IHeartRadio app, Apple
podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. When a group of women discover they've all dated
the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his last
target. He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves. We always say
that trust your girlfriends. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe, on the Iheart radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hello everybody and welcome back to the psychology
of your 20s, the podcast where we talk through some of the big life changes and transitions of our 20s,
and what they mean for our psychology.
Hello everybody.
Before we get into the episode,
I wanted to let you guys know
that we now have a YouTube channel.
You guys have been asking for video episodes
and video versions of the podcast for so long,
we finally were able to make it happen.
We've been doing it for a couple of months now.
So if you like watching your podcast,
if you want to see behind the scenes,
if you want to see some more live and in your face recordings,
that is where you should go. It's just the psychology of your 20s on YouTube. I'd really appreciate
you quickly jumping over there and subscribing because it's a new platform for me. It's a new thing
that I am trying out. But I hope you enjoy it. I hope you love it. Without further ado,
let's get into the episode. Hello everybody. Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to the podcast.
New listeners, old listeners, wherever you are in the world. It is so great to have you here back for
another episode as we of course break down the psychology of our 20s. Today, we are talking about
failure, but not the bad parts about failure, not even why failure necessarily sucks or feels terrible,
but rather, we're doing a full 180 mindset shift on this. We're going to talk about the gift of
failure and how falling in love with failure, maybe even deliberately running towards
it will unlock your dream life and so much of what you desire for yourself faster than probably
any other method out there. Now, this episode, this is going to sound so strange, but it was weirdly
inspired by Victoria Beckham, i.e. Posh Spice. Stay with me here. I know this feels very off
brand for me, but I watched her documentary on Netflix the other day where she describes basically
the highs and lows of her career. I posted it on my story and so many of you responded and it weirdly
brought up so many reflections for me on failure. Now obviously she is a celebrity. She had a lot of
control over the narrative that was portrayed in that documentary. But I think my own relationship to
failure has changed so much recently that everything she was talking about kind of resonated on a
new level. And for the first time in my life, I feel more positive about it than negative.
My whole life isn't focused on avoiding failure anymore. And it definitely was when I was younger.
I was so obsessed with making sure every single step, every single decision was the perfect
decision, never falling short of my expectations. But strangely, you know, this is the year that I have
failed more than I ever have before and maybe I'll talk about it a little bit further down the
line when some of the dust has kind of settled but I have failed more this year than any other
year in my life and I have never felt more confident and certain in what I'm doing almost because
of that. So let's talk about it today. What is the freedom that you can find in failure,
especially in your 20s in the so-called failure decade? Why is it that failure is one of the
singular things that all successful people have in common, no matter what industry they're in
across time, what is it about those people that approach failure differently to the rest of us?
And from that, how can we cultivate a mindset that sees this as us actually getting closer to what
we want rather than further away? That's going to sound strange, given how we've been taught to
think about this experience, but I promise it will make more sense as the episode goes on. I am
so into talking about this topic at the moment in my own life and with my friends.
So I hope you can kind of feel that energy like coming off me right now.
I'm so excited to get into it.
Without further ado, let's talk about why we need to fall in love and how we can fall in
love with failure.
Stay with us.
So let's start with a very simple question.
Why do we fear failure?
I say simple, but there are many, many layers to this conundrum, starting with the most
basic explanation, which is that we fear failure because it feels bad. Simple as that. It injures our
ego. It's embarrassing. That creates, you know, emotional, psychological and social pain within us.
Really, what it's based in is self-worth and how much we implicitly tie self-worth to external
achievement and the progress, the visible progress we make towards our goals. When we view it,
ourselves as creatures of output and I guess also creatures of performance whose value is derived
from what we do rather than who we are inherently.
Anytime we come up short of what we expect of ourselves or what others expect from us,
it strikes really deep, deep into our sense of character.
And it also attaches to things like our discipline, our intelligence, our innate talent,
our ability to work out, our creativity, strength, all of those things are deeply personal self-assessments and deeply personal attributes.
So when we feel like because we have failed, it's because we lack those things or there is some deficiency in those things.
That is deeply painful and it's mainly first and foremost to do without ego.
Now, of course, this didn't come from nowhere.
if you have ever been around children recently, specifically young kids, you will notice they don't
really concern themselves with whether what they're doing is good or comparatively better than anyone
else or up to their own standards. All they want to do is explore and learn and appreciate and love.
And then at some stage, this pressure gets added onto them, onto us.
Now, of course, you know, kids make mistakes, but all their mistakes are like, hey, when I jump off the playground, I will break my arm. I'm not going to jump off the playground.
Or when I hit someone, I will be scolded. These are all lessons and, you know, mistakes that hopefully shape them into good and safe people.
When there is an academic setting, when they enter a schooling setting, that's when like this idea of failure that we know now actually begins to take hold.
the idea of like, there is a way I should perform.
There is something I should be able to do or obtain.
People have expectations for me to be able to do this.
And so when I don't, that means I am not good enough.
That means I have failed.
It should come as no surprise that this situation, this setting,
combined with a critical childhood environment,
specifically parents who have high standards for us and make that known,
this really exacerbates the situation and this feeling or fear of failure.
You know, our parents may just want better for us.
We can give them the benefit of the doubt in these situations and say, you know, they
just thought that what they were doing was correct.
But in the end, studies on critical parenting have found the long-term effects of this
are actually probably the reverse of what our parents expected.
It's perfectionism.
It's a crippling desire to succeed.
but that actually creates greater procrastination, greater inflexibility,
incapable high standards that make failure feel like such an emotional burden
that the only way to avoid it is to not even try.
Over time as well, I feel like their voice, the voice of the critical parent,
begins to mold with our own inner critic's voice as well.
And so it's almost impossible to indistinguish them.
Like when we feel like we have failed, all we hear is their voice in our head saying,
try harder.
That's not good enough.
That doesn't meet my standards.
I'm disappointed in you.
These experiences, and there's so many others that are like this,
but these experiences create learned associations where failure feels unsafe.
Psychologically, our brains code it as a threat.
activating that same kind of panicked response we would have for anything that's terrifying or fearful or
threatening. So really what it is is that our sense of failure comes from social expectation and
these rules around what success is and isn't. And those rules are the ones that we have inherited from
generations and generations before us. And these rules are based on this hierarchy for what is successful and
what is not. Often success means having more, being the best, obtaining more, being number one,
this elevated status. What's interesting is that, again, that is completely socially conditioned
and subjective. You know, animals don't agonize over their failures. Our perception of whether
we've failed or been successful as well, like really changes based on what we've been told about the task
or told about the thing that we're doing or about certain performance metrics.
Take for example, this is the example actually I used with a friend the other day,
the 200 meter sprint at the Olympics.
Now, if you want to win gold, if you want to be a so-called success at that sport,
being the fastest would make you a winner.
Being the slowest would make you think of yourself as a failure.
But imagine if the actual task of the 200 meters was to run backwards,
or was to cartwheel the whole thing.
The fastest person would then be seen as a failure
because the structure of the task has changed,
not because of anything that's wrong with them.
They are still the fastest, that just doesn't matter.
This is the same with life sometimes.
You know, there is a big focus, again,
on accumulating, on being the best, on getting ahead.
But if our performance metrics for the task of life
was instead to enjoy ourselves,
to love more, to experience more, to try and to fail and to learn, all, like this whole hierarchy,
this all concept of what makes someone a success and what makes someone a failure would change
because it is socially conditioned.
I think aside from that, on a more personal level, you know, sometimes we fear failure
because we actually just don't like the idea of being seen, of being in the spotlight.
for seemingly the wrong reasons.
You don't actually have a fear of failing.
You fear failing in public.
I think this is why we resonate a lot with those videos that are like,
I disappeared for a year and I came back a whole new person.
Like people love those videos.
And I saw someone say it's because the disappearing part allows us to conceal the occasional
ugliness of trying and failing.
The disappearing part means that we don't have to see all the times that someone did not
meet their own expectations or felt like they had fallen behind.
Our fear of being perceived is where this comes from.
Also on another non-social level, sometimes it's just the cost of failure that scares us.
Now, of course, that's the financial cost.
It's also the time cost, the energy costs, the effort costs, the opportunity cost
that we could have put elsewhere.
When we put a lot into something and it doesn't go our way, it feels like a waste.
And our natural human loss aversion, this instinct we have, it cringes at that feeling.
You know, if we strip away all the social pressure, the disappointment, the comparison,
sometimes we just really want something for ourselves and we bet everything we have on it
and it doesn't happen.
And that lack of a payout is what can be devastating.
And this is where the relationship between privilege and failure is so important to discuss.
The cost of failure, it's going to differ for different people and that will change the psychological
relationship that we have with it.
From a psychological standpoint, our willingness to take risks is influenced by something that we call perceived safety.
if we grow up with financial or social privilege,
access to education,
access to second chances,
supportive networks,
family wealth,
or simply the reassurance that you can recover,
your brain will learn that failure is survivable.
You can afford to see it as a learning experience
rather than a threat.
And this creates a more secure mindset,
one that supports experimentation and creativity and resilience.
It's like that documentary, you know, to bring up Victoria Beckham twice in this episode.
You know, someone DM'd me and she made a great point that, yes, she was brave to try.
But her company did go bankrupt and she did have a multi-millionaire husband to support that.
And that safety net is actually what secured her inevitable success, not just her attitude towards failure.
It's easier to take those kinds of risks when you have security, food, warmth, and money.
In contrast, when money is tight or opportunities are scarce, you know, failure isn't just emotional,
as it is with everybody.
It's also about survival.
And it can trigger a deep sense of danger and scarcity that some people, you know, they just may never feel that.
People who have less privilege often develop what Columbia University psychologists,
They first labeled this in the 90s.
It's called a prevention focus.
So a prevention focus means that their motivation for doing well or for pursuing things
centers on avoiding loss rather than seeking growth.
It's not like they're less ambitious or less capable.
It's not even that they're less likely to achieve what they want or be successful.
It's just that for them, their motivation is different and the stakes are high.
entire. If you have, in contrast, a promotion focus compared to a prevention focus, your motivation
is, I love the idea of winning. I'm envisioning how good this is going to feel. I want a successful
life. I want to challenge myself. It's less about I want to escape poverty. And it's less about
I want to avoid bankrupting myself or my family and more about what can be an addition to your life.
So when we say don't be afraid to fail, we do need to acknowledge that that is much easier advice to follow when you have a safety net.
And I just felt the need to say that because going forward, obviously I'm going to talk about how we can celebrate failures, big and small.
But we do have to make that caveat that, you know, there is another part of this picture that you can't just ignore.
So when we fear failure, whether because of context, attitude, psychology, upbringing, a few things happen.
Firstly, I often find that the more I want something, the more I don't want to fail, the harder it actually
becomes to act on that feeling or to achieve that dream because I am so scared of jinxing it that
you know the pressure amounts to do and to act but with each step there is this constant back and
forth, internally that's like, well, is this the exact right next step?
Will I regret my next move?
And so I don't end up doing anything.
You've probably heard of this term, analysis paralysis.
This is what this is describing.
You're so invested in the outcome of a decision that you actually can't make the decision
because the possibility of it being wrong paralyzes you, petrifies you.
So instead of taking that chance, you just do nothing.
and as a result, you get nowhere.
We may label it as different things.
You may call it self-sabotage, avoidance, procrastination, laziness.
No, it all actually stems from wanting something really deeply.
And it stems from that fear of failure.
The second consequence is that you may still be able to act and make decisions,
but you've kind of got like one foot in and one foot out.
You kind of, we call it playing defensively.
You hesitate before taking the leap.
And because you hesitate, that actually hurts you.
It's no surprise that a lot of research on this has been done with elite student athletes or just elite athletes in general.
In fact, one meta-analysis I found from 2021 found that in the last 10 years, over 45 studies on the fear of failure in rugby players, basketball players, sprinters, I don't know,
water polo players all show that fearing failure is a significant predictor of poorer performance because it
creates anxiety around what the next move will be. And it means that, again, people play defensively.
It's almost like we fear failure to protect ourselves from failure, but it actually makes the chances of
failure greater. It's all like an illusion, an illusion of control. The final cost of fear,
failure is that we don't allow ourselves to experiment. Even if we can act on our desires,
and we do find success, we still remain quite rigid and quite inflexible. We don't try and use
things. We don't take risks. We can develop this deep sense that at any moment this can all be
taken away, even when we have success, even when we got an A, even when we got the job we wanted,
we got the promotion, we got the deal. It doesn't feel.
good enough because now we're imagining not having it and that fear still haunts us.
I can personally say this has happened to me when my podcast first started gaining listeners,
not to like break the fourth wall here, but when it did and it was very unexpected, I was just
paralyzed by like, this can be taken away at any moment and I could still fail.
I could still like, this could all just go away.
and it meant that I didn't try things and that I was so, like, I just felt like handcuffed to everything that I'd always done, like the first two years of the show, like, trying to make it exactly as it always was that I didn't like experiment.
And it's probably only now that I've been like, okay, who cares? Like, I'm going to try new things.
There's no point succeeding at something if I don't actually enjoy the process.
This is the thing that all successful people know to be true and that I have learned from being around successful people,
and having the privilege to be around successful people,
you cannot win if you don't have some skin in the game.
You will not find love if you never open the door to the possibility of being hurt.
You will never be considered at work if you're too scared to put your hand up and say,
I want that.
You will never be recognized for your art if you don't make it.
And that means starting from a place that you may not be proud of
and that may make you consider yourself a failure.
You know those times when, like, you've heard a quote so many times before and then it just
suddenly takes on like a whole deeper new meaning for you.
That is this quote for me.
Like you've got to have some skin in the game.
That is like how I really am planning to live my life for the next couple of months or
hopefully forever.
You have to be prepared to fail and to maybe be hurt.
Sixthestful people also know that you need to have enough equal.
go to think you can do it, but not too much that you don't think setbacks say anything other than
I have more to learn, or this isn't my time. You have to just be stupidly stubborn and delusional about your
ideas. I read this fantastic excerpt from the book, The Anatomy of a Breakthrough by Adam Adler,
where he talks about how the perfect success to failure ratio is around 16%. So one in six times,
16% of the time, you will make errors or you will have to make an error or you will have to
fail in order to find success. And he looks at these case studies or the researchers looked at
these case studies of all these successful people, successful businesses, successful artists,
and all of them kind of came back to this failure point, 16% of the time.
One in six times they tried something. They objectively or subjectively, they failed.
But once you allow that to be the case and you make room for that, that's when your progress
actually skyrockets.
That is the secret to success.
Okay, we're going to talk about some of the other ways that you can reframe and fall in love
with failure after this short break.
Stay with us.
2%.
That is the number of people who take the stairs when there is also an escalator available.
I'm Michael Easter.
And on my podcast, 2%, I break down the same.
science of mental toughness, fitness, and building resilience in our strange modern world.
I'll be speaking with writers, researchers, and other health and fitness experts, and more,
to look past the impractical and way too complex pseudoscience that dominates the wellness industry.
We really believe that seed oils were inherently inflammatory.
We got it wrong.
Many of the problems that we are freaked out about in the world are the result of stress.
Put yourself through some hardships.
and you will come out on the other side a happier, more fulfilled, healthier person.
Listen to 2%.
That's T-W-O-P-O-P-Sent on the I-Hart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tap Little Kim's boobs at the VMAs?
Or when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black people.
I know what you're thinking.
What the hell does George Bush got to do with Little Kim?
Well, you can find out on the Look Back at a podcast.
I'm Sam Jette.
And I'm Alex English.
Each episode, we pick it here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it.
Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill, waxing all about crack in the 80s.
To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just because of crack.
I'm down to talk about crack on day, but just so y'all know.
I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've discussed crack.
So I'm starting to see that there's a through line.
We also have AIDS on the table right now.
Thank you for finishing that sentence.
Yes. I don't think there's a more important year for black people.
Really?
Yeah.
For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history.
Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Welcome to my new podcast, Learn the Hard Way with me, your host, and your favorite therapist, Kear Games.
And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests.
I'm talking, Tripp Fontaine.
Ryan Clark.
Sometimes when we're in the pursuit of the thing,
we get so wrapped up in the chase
that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing
and we're still chasing it
and we don't know when we've done enough.
Because people scoreboard watch.
Life becomes about wins and losses.
Steve Burns, Dustin Ross,
because you find it important to be a good person
while you hear on earth or are you a good person
because you're afraid?
Because that's two different intentions, bro.
Absolutely.
And that's two different levels of trust.
I want you to just really be a good person.
Join me, Kear Gaines,
as we have real conversations about healing,
growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose
on my new podcast, Learn the Hardway.
Open your free iHeartRadio app.
Search Learn the Hardway and listen now.
In 2023, former Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd
found himself at the center of a paternity scandal.
The family court hearings that followed
revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story.
This began a years-long court battle
to prove the truth.
You doctored this particular test twice in so-ins, correct?
I doctored the test ones.
It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case.
I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for.
Sunlight's the greatest disinfected.
They would uncover a disturbing pattern.
Two more men who'd been through the same thing.
Gregalespian and Michael Marincini.
My mind was blown.
I'm Stephanie Young.
This is Love Trap.
Laura, Scottsdale Police.
As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences.
Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news at Americopa County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges.
This isn't over until justice is served in Arizona.
Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Okay, so I want to give you a few other ways you can allow yourself to fall in love with
failure. We've been talking a lot about what successful people do differently and what that
teaches us about the relationship we have between failure and thriving. And I want to cite one more
study on this topic. It is one of my favorite studies of all time. And if you follow me on
Instagram at that psychology podcast for a little plug, you most certainly will have heard of it.
I talk about it there like probably more than I should. But it is a study by Angela Duckworth that
found that more than anything else, more than IQ, even at times more than background and how
you were raised, the thing that predicts success in people is grit. Grit, the ability to persevere
even in tough times, the ability to fail and to push through despite difficulty. This is the thing
that she found time and time again bridges the gap between raw talent or limited talent
and actually achieving your goals and achieving your dreams.
It's a tolerance for failure.
It's the ability to grate your teeth and just say,
I might have to suffer for this dream and I might have to be pained by this dream and by what happens,
but I'm going to do it anyway.
Anyways, and that's the superpower.
Something to add on to this as well is that not only is failure just a part of the progress
and process sometimes, it is, if nothing else, the most efficient way to get ahead.
to fail forward.
That's like the saying, right?
To fail forward.
You will never, and I truly believe this,
you will never learn faster than you will learn from failing
because the emotional resonance of it is going to mean the lesson is not forgotten.
You know, they find this in experiments on learning in memory.
People remember better when a negative experience was attached to a choice
versus when they were slowly rewarded towards the right choice.
I think it also means when you fail you get to close doors you'd otherwise just sit staring at
and just sit and contemplate for longer than you needed to when the outcome was always going to be the
same you just waited longer to get there personally I think this is especially the case with love
I'm sure my friends sick of hearing me say this but I always say to them like if you really like someone
don't agonize over whether they like you back or whatever.
Like, ask them, make a move.
Say, like, I want to date you or, like, I want to be committed or I want to see you.
And you will get your answer really quick.
Either it's a yes or a no.
And if it's a no, then you've just saved yourself, like, so much time that you otherwise
would have spent worrying about being rejected or worrying about failing in this, like,
relationship scenario. Failure also creates growth because, yes, it is a fast delivery system
for lessons, but also because through challenge and sometimes through loss, like you gain
resilience and you gain new skills. Whenever I fail, I always think to myself and I always think
about bodybuilders, actually, really buff people and how they build muscle. They
They build muscle by breaking their muscle down.
Intense exercise actually creates these tiny microscopic damage or tears to the muscle,
which the body then fills in and rebuilds to make them stronger.
I always think about this.
You have to break muscle to build it back.
Sometimes you have to experience the unpleasantness of failure to know what went wrong,
to know why it probably wasn't the right time,
and to come back and to do it better and to build the muscle.
failure is like is such a gift in that way like the pain is never for nothing like there's always
some kind of growth on the other side so when we take all of these like lessons and learnings
from research and like from the lives of people we admire you start to really see that when you
change your relationship to failure you do become untouchable because the emotional reaction
you have to it will no longer slow you down in fact it will speed things up because it will
feel you, it will motivate you, it will direct you. How I picture this for all of us is like
encountering failure and like genuinely being like, oh my God, yes, and like celebrating it and
being like, this is amazing. And maybe that's a bit far-fetched that we could have such a positive
reaction to it. But I like to imagine, you know, not getting the grade, not getting the job, not getting
the time for your run, not getting the progress you wanted and being like, this is a gold mine for me.
This is like a treasure of learnings that everyone who succeeded on their first go or everyone who didn't try, they don't get this.
They don't get these lessons.
Like these are just for me.
These are just for the people who try and fail.
No one else gets those.
You know, I can't speak for you guys, but sometimes as well, nothing motivates me more than being told I can't do things or not being successful the first time around.
having to prove it to myself or maybe to others.
We know that this has a name.
It's called the underdog effect or the rebellion theory.
Your need to prove yourself or others or your failures wrong actually has such a deeply
motivational power that can at times be stronger than just your own initial urge to
want something.
Like I have to prove this wrong.
This rebellion effect is like whether it's spite, whether it's ego, whatever it is, whether
it's pride, it drives you and it forces you to get back on the horse.
So to finish this episode, I'm going to give you some rapid fire tips to kind of ritualize
failure in your life and therefore fall in love with it, to practice it like you were to craft
or a skill.
Firstly, I'm going to challenge you to just start when you don't yet know whether things will
be perfect.
Start without all the information, whether it's an essay, an assignment, whether it's a
for a job you don't quite know you're qualified for, whether it's asking someone on a date.
This might be hard if you're a perfectionist, but the biggest hurdle, I think, we actually need
to get over is the first hurdle. Whenever we want to do something, the first hurdle is the
hardest of just being like, I'm going to act. I'm going to stop thinking about it and I'm going to do
something, getting over that initial fear that stops the impulse. I like to use the five-minute
principle. This basically says you can do a lot of things in five minutes and for five minutes.
So whatever it is, why not just try for five minutes and see how you feel? Try and start to write that book.
Just do five minutes of writing, five minutes of painting, five minutes of this job application,
five minutes of the essay. And you'll actually notice that you end up having a lot of momentum and
you know, how much you thought this was going to be difficult. You thought that this task was going to be hard
or burdensome. It's actually not. And you actually find a lot of joy in doing it. And it probably felt
like a lot of work. But, you know, the work was actually just what your mind has created to stop you from trying.
The first, like the five minute principle is so fantastic for getting over like the initial stagnation or the
initial, the initial fears that kind of hold you back from doing. I also say once a month, be a beginner.
just do something that you've never done before and be terrible at it.
I was doing this a lot last year with like pottery.
I was doing, I don't know what I was thinking,
but I was in this like intermediate class and I was terrible.
I also was the person who had the most fun.
Like I can objectively say I was having the most fun because I didn't care.
Like I didn't care if this was like,
it's just sometimes the best feeling being the worst at something because the only way you can go is up.
and you just get to like hang out in this place of experimentation and you're going to hang out
in this place of just being completely excited by what there is to learn.
I'd also ask you to be reflective and just to look back at times that you've failed in the past
to see how much wiser you have become because of it.
You know, some of the ways I've failed is like I didn't, I've talked about this before.
Like, you know, I applied for all these internships and jobs when I was first living university.
and I didn't get like a single one.
And I had to come back the year afterwards and apply again.
And, you know, luckily I got one offer.
That first year felt like a failure.
I came back and I was doing better the second time.
At least, you know, I had a job by that stage as well.
Like so many failures that it's almost hard for me to even call them out as failures
because they've just been integrated into my life as lessons.
like obviously I did my half marathon a couple of weeks ago right and there was a lot of failure
leading up to that runs that I just didn't finish runs that would like I walked that just felt awful
it's hard for me to even see those as failures because like they had to happen I had to get them
out of the way to get to the good stuff I'd also say try and have a process for what you will do
or give to yourself after you have failed almost
just make it like a date night, like the day after you realize, like, oh my God, maybe I have to
quit this thing. Maybe this will just not work. Maybe this is a so-called failure. Reward yourself.
Go take yourself out for dinner, get a glass of wine, get some pasta, bring your journal,
and just write down everything that you learned from that. Everything that this moment has taught
you that is going to really help you in the future. And I also,
want you to be very diligent and honest with yourself about what was within your control during
this situation and what was outside of your control, what you can change, what you are responsible
for and what you are not. Now, in absorbing failure, that doesn't mean that we need to just be like,
well, this was all my fault. I just need to work harder. I just didn't have it in me this time.
sometimes it is just timing.
Sometimes it is just the situation and it is just context and it is just that someone worked harder
than you or someone got to the idea before you or someone had more privilege than you.
It's important to acknowledge those things so that you don't take the entire burden of a misstep
or a missed opportunity onto yourself, but also realize and take what can be changed and make sure
that that is the more important thing.
The most important thing is what you choose to do with the circumstances and also what you
can learn from the previous situations and apply.
So acknowledge it, but don't linger for too long and just take the lessons.
And remember what I said before.
Those lessons are something that the person who tries, the person who just like succeeds in
their first try, sorry, does not get, this is like, you are the only one who gets these
lessons. I'd also say just try and get more comfortable with sharing failures. I'm so lucky I have
friends where we do this all the time. We talk very openly about the things that didn't go right.
And that's honestly just so reassuring sometimes and just so comforting to be like,
okay, someone else has been here. And just remember that if you are going to fail,
the best time to do it is now. Especially if you're,
in your 20s, I know most of us are, it is the psychology of your 20s after all. Like,
this is the failure decade. I really don't think that you're actually even an adult until like 30.
This is just like your trial period, right? This is like the probation period for your job.
This is the probation period for your adult life. This is just where nothing, like you can just
try and fail and just like completely maybe even make it full of yourself, hopefully not, but like,
just completely be a beginner and it won't, it won't do anything other than make things better
in the future because you have learned. And will make you a more empathetic person, will make you a
wiser person, will probably make you a more successful person rather than if you just sat and
waited for everything to be perfect without ever actually learning a lesson from your mistakes.
I will also say a quote, a final quote that has been resonating with me when we talk about failure,
when we talk about having big dreams for ourselves, which I really hope you do.
I hope you have big dreams for yourself is a quote from The Alchemist.
I recently reread that book.
It's one of my favorite books.
I've read it so many times and it felt like a great time to reread it.
And in the book, there's this very famous quote.
When you have a dream, the whole universe conspires to make it come true.
when you really want something, forces beyond you will conspire to make it happen.
I don't know if that's true, to be honest, but I've felt it.
I've felt what I think is a version of it.
And I think it's something to really hold on to that wanting something and acting on it
is never not going to be rewarded in some way or another.
People love to see people who are working hard.
People love to be inspired and motivated by people who go after their dreams.
that's you. That's going to be your situation. Those can be your circumstances where the universe,
God, the source, whatever it is, just the powers that be conspiring in your favor because you have
put, you know, had some skin in the game. You've put yourself on the line and said, like, I'm willing
to sacrifice and learn for what I want. So I think that is all we have time for. You guys know I've been doing
this thing where if you've made it this far on the episode, hello.
welcome. Thank you for listening. I've been asking people to leave stories or leave something in the comments
that, you know, it's just for the people who've made it to this point. And today I really want to learn from
your failures. What has been the biggest failure in your 20s? I want you to share if you feel comfortable
the details of it below or you can be vague about it just so that we can learn from each other
and also so that we can feel that this is, and normalize, that this is important.
Particularly if maybe you're in your later 20s or even not in your 20s at all,
what was something that you failed at in your early 20s that you're glad that you did?
I really want to, I really want to know, I want to be able to learn from that,
make it feel more normal and just like a completely natural part of growth.
But I appreciate you listening as far as you have.
If you are not already, make sure you are following us wherever you are listening,
to the show right now on Spotify, on Apple Podcasts, on the IHeart radio app.
We have December guest month coming up in a couple of weeks, no, in like a month, not a
couple of weeks, several weeks.
And I want you to be around for that because, oh my gosh, we have some insane guests this
year.
I just finished recording with one of them earlier and the conversation went for over two
hours.
I don't know how I'm going to cut it down, but make sure that you are around for that exciting
chapter.
each year I love doing our guest series.
So I can't wait for you guys to hear it.
And that you're following us on Instagram as well at That Psychology Podcast.
We also have a YouTube and we have an Instagram.
No, I already said that.
We have a YouTube and we have a substact.
If you want the transcript to the episodes, including this episode right here,
you can follow us there.
It's obviously completely free.
But until next time, stay safe, be kind.
Be gentle to yourself.
Embrace, celebrate fall in love with.
failure and we will talk very very soon.
Hey, what's good, y'all?
You're listening to Learn the Hardway
with your favorite therapist and host Keer Games.
This space is about black men's experiences,
having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere,
but you're having them with a licensed professional
who knows what he's doing.
How many men carry a suit or armor?
It signals to the world that you're not to be played with.
And just because you have the capability
that does not mean that you need to.
Listen to learn the hard.
Broadway on the AHA radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.
In 2023, Bachelor star Clayton Eckerd was accused of fathering twins.
But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax.
You doctored this particular test twice in so much, correct?
I doctored the test ones.
It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern.
Two more men who'd been through the same thing.
Greg Gillespie and Michael Ranini.
My mind was blown.
I'm Stephanie Young.
This is Love Trapped.
Laura, Scottsdale Police.
As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences.
Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
2%.
That's the number of people who take the stairs when there is also an escalator available.
I'm Michael Easter.
I'm on my podcast, 2%.
I break down the signs of mental toughness, fitness, and building resilience in our strange modern world.
Put yourself through some hardships, and you will come out on the other side a happier, more fulfilled, healthier person.
Listen to 2%.
That's TWO percent on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist, they take matters into their own hands.
I vowed, I will be his last target.
He is not going to get away with this.
He's going to get what he deserves.
We always say that trust your girlfriends.
Listen to the girlfriends.
Trust me, babe, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
This is an IHeart podcast.
Guaranteed human.
