Today’s video is based on a quote by Zig Ziglar…”Failure is an event, not a person”.
When we fail at something, it’s usually down to a skills deficit, which means it is fixable. It’s not because of a defecit in you personally, only in what you know, or don’t know.
How’re you doing? I’m Kevin O’Hara for alcoholmastery.com.
Today’s topic is based around a quotation from a guy called Zig Ziggler, who is a motivational speaker from the last few decades.
The quotation is ‘Failure is an event not a person’.
Too often we look at failure as if it’s something personal; something to do with us.
As if it’s something in our genetic make up or our education, or our intelligence.
This is all taking things a very personal level.
Most of the time, it’s nothing like that.
When you fail at something, it’s because you don’t have a skill.
It’s something that is fixable.
You can learn from it.
You can move on.
You can be successful in whatever you want to do.
So, life is dynamic.
Life, education, and growth are all about trying to do something, making a mistake, educating yourself and trying again.
I hate seeing people who fail when they’re trying to quit drinking because it’s such a simple process.
The process is, ‘don’t put the alcohol in your mouth’.
The reason most people fail at this is because they can’t separate themselves from the alcohol.
They just cannot separate themselves from that core belief that are a drinker, or that this is the only way to do things.
There’s another way where people manage to quit for a long time, and then something will happen in their lives which puts them out of control.
And because they haven’t learned coping mechanisms for specific situations, they will go back to the drinking just to get over that hurdle.
It could be someone important has died, or something serious has happened that has just affected everything else, and it’s the only thing they can do.
Whether you can’t seem to quit, or you’ve quit for along time and gone back to it because of some trauma, all these things are reversible.
There are very few things in life that are irreversible.
You can do something about most things.
You can learn how to cope without alcohol very easily.
You learn gradually over the years.
When you take it down to its most basic level, alcohol is a poison.
It’s a toxin you’re taking into your body, and your body learns to cope with that.
So it’s just the reverse of that.
What we think is that we can’t teach old dogs new tricks.
We have that mentality.
We think that because we’ve always drank, that we have to always do that.
As long as you think about your present or future self in the same language of what you’ve done in the past, and you believe that your present or your future represents the past and has to be done the same way you did in the past, then you’re always going to fail.
Don’t be afraid or ashamed, or feel any guilt about failing; whether it’s with the alcohol, or something you’re trying to achieve in your life.
Don’t be afraid of it.
Don’t let anyone else try and make you feel ashamed of it.
You have to put it behind you.
Learn from your mistakes and get back up onto the path again, onto your new journey.
Just don’t do it again.
Every time you make a mistake, you have to repeat this same process.
We’re surrounded by propaganda that will tell you that you’re one drink from being an alcoholic.
Propaganda that will tell you you’ll always be an alcoholic.
Most people who drink alcohol have a problem with it.
They are dependent on it to a certain degree.
It’s the nature of the beast.
Alcohol is a drug, and it will affect you in the same way as someone else because it’s a drug.
There are different degrees, of course.
It will affect someone who is bigger or smaller than you in a different way, someone who has a different temperament than you differently.
But from a physical perspective, we’re all affected by the same drug in the same way as someone else.
The same rules apply.
There are just so many different people out there making a lot of money by propagating this bullshit, that people are going to be alcoholics for the rest of their lives.
Alcohol companies are making a fortune out of telling us that drinking alcohol is a normal thing, that it should be drunk as part of our normal lives.
So, think about it like that.
Failure is an event, not a person.
That’s a critical distinction.
All experience in life, all education, all growth is going to come at the expense of certain failures in certain aspects of your life.
The biggest thing is when you’re afraid of doing something, and through that fear, through the fact that you don’t want to appear stupid in front of someone, or you don’t want to have your pride hurt, you don’t want to fail.
This is what stops people from doing the things they need to do in order to grow, move forward and get the best out of their lives.
They just do nothing.
That’s the real failure in life, when your fear stops you from going out there and trying to do something in your life.
So, there’s only one antidote to this.
That’s to take bold action.
Go out and do the things you want to do, the things that are necessary.
Make the mistakes.
Take the failures and learn by them.
Keep trying.
If at first you don’t succeed, that’s the best way of doing this.
Don’t be afraid of looking stupid.
We all do at certain times in our lives.
From a personal perspective, I was looking more and more like a dick when I was drinking and refusing to change.
That was making me look more and more like an idiot.
Since I stopped drinking, it hasn’t been like I made no mistakes.
I made a lot, just not in that one core thing of not putting any more alcohol past these lips.
That’s the one thing I haven’t done.
But, I’ve made mistake after mistake.
The difference is that most of the time with those mistakes, I’ve learned something and tried something differently.
I’ve needed to grow, to improve myself.
Necessity is the mother of all invention, that you really push yourself despite a failure, and despite the fact that you haven’t got the confidence to do what’s necessary.
That’s half the reason that you do fail, you haven’t got enough confidence.
That’s my take.
Failure is not a person.
Don’t take it personally.
You just need to learn a skill; something new in order to push yourself over the obstacles.
Look at all failures as little detours.
Get back onto the path.
Do what you need to do and carry on.
Anyway, if you have any questions, give us a shout on the website or on YouTube.
We also have the Quit Alcohol starter pack.
It has 3 books and 3 videos, and a couple of other bits and pieces.
Until next time, take care of yourself, and keep the alcohol out of your mouth.
FAILURE IS NOT THE OPPOSITE OF SUCCESS; IT IS PART OF SUCCESS.
Until next time…
Onwards and Upwards!
0 Comments