Failure - Speak or Read the Word - How Does It Make You Feel?

Failure is part of the human existence, unfortunately. We all think it and live it, some more than others but overuse that dastardly word. It stresses us out to the max. It connotes fear, negativity, promotes ill feelings and makes us sick.

We are afraid of it and draw it to us as our best friend then try to fight it because it repulses us.

Once you get into a funk you start thinking of everything that is not right, in other words, failure and that negativity can and does take over unless you make a concerted effort to consciously step out of that space and think good thoughts.

There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure. ― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

The problem is, and I know this for myself, is that when you think of one little thing that went wrong we blow it out of proportion then memories of other unconnected happenings big and small come tumbling out and we end up beating ourselves up.
Failure should not be in our lives at all, it has no place there. We are not here to fail but most of us have grown up with that idea. 
Madisyn Taylor of DailyOM has written a superb piece about Failure and it is such a significant and important topic it must be read. She talks about the way fear rules our consciousness when the all encompassing word is used.

We human beings must find a  way to short-circuit negativity, for our own good and the well-being of the whole.

Read the article, open yourself up to the truth of the message her words, do the work needed on yourself and then banish that word, as she suggests, from your dictionary, no matter how long it takes. It's worth it.

Failure ~ Madisyn Taylor

All you have to do is speak or read the word failure and see how it makes you feel.

The word failure puts forward a very simplistic way of thinking that allows for only two possibilities: failure or success. Few things in the universe are black and white, yet much of our language reads as if they are.

The word failure signifies a paradigm in which all subtlety is lost.

When we regard something we have done, or ourselves, as a failure, we lose our ability to see the truth, which is no doubt considerably more complex. In addition, we hurt ourselves. All you have to do is speak or read the word failure and see how it makes you feel.

At some point, the word may not have been so loaded with the weight of negativity, and it simply referred to something that did not go according to plan.

Unfortunately, in our culture it is often used very negatively, such as when a person is labeled a failure, even though it is impossible for something as vast and subtle as a human being to be reduced in such a way.

It also acts as a deterrent, scaring us from taking risks for fear of failure. It has somehow come to represent the worst possible outcome.

Failure is a word so burdened with fearful and unconscious energy that we can all benefit from consciously examining our use of it, because the language we use influences the way we think and feel.

Next time you feel like a failure or fear failure, know that you are under the influence of an outmoded way of perceiving the world. When the world failure comes up, it’s a call for us to apply a more enlightened consciousness to the matter at hand. When you are consciously aware of the word and its baggage you will not fall victim to its darkness.

In your own use of language, you may choose to stop using the word failure altogether. This might encourage you to articulate more clearly the truth of the situation, opening your mind to subtleties and possibilities the word failure would never have allowed.

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts. ― Winston Churchill