The Gift of Failure
DNF’s are Shitty. Not reaching your goal time is equally shitty. They can feel like a punch to the gut. We’ve trained so long and hard for something that the fall feels equally long and hard.
It escalates more if we are engrossed in the outcome that nothing can stand in the way of the …that makes the fall harder and harder to get up from.
Failure has so many negative connotations and the meaning of which can be determined by the deeply held belief system about ourselves…(go ahead…ask yourself what it means to fail…) but often what gets missed is that Failure is a gift
The road is never straight…
We can learn a lot from failing but we can not get consumed in it and can’t let the negative conotations deter our long term goals.
The best athletes are the ones who get a DNF, have a poor performance and show up the next day at practice determined, focused, and ready to go. They know that failing doesn’t mean the end of the world, they don’t take it personally. They take the information they got from the experience and learn something from it. Maybe they implement something into their training differently next time, maybe they run the race differently next time. Maybe they implement a mental skills program into their training. Whatever they decide they use the fall to motivate and learn.
Failure does not define you. It defines a moment in time and in time there are a lot of moments. You have a choice in the direction you take.
We actually become more resilient when we do fail, we learn how to bounce back. The bumps and turns in the road become easier.
Embrace it. Suck the marrow out of the gift.
When a child first begins to walk they wobble a bit, the fall. They may laugh and giggle, but then they get back up and try it again.
The same for a violinist. They practice a few notes. Maybe one of those notes sounds retchid. But they try it again and again until it’s right.
DNF’s, DNS’s, and misses of time goals are part of that process…
Here are a couple of things that I think are necessary after a DNF or bad race:
1) Allow yourself time to grieve. It’s normal to feel upset. This was something you put a lot of energy and time into. Journal about the grief, write it down. Write your frustration, your anger and your sadness.
2) Review. Dig into the cause. Training error? Racing error? Mental error? Review but don’t obsess. Give yourself a deadline. Then, move on. (Note: I am not saying give yourself a deadline to grieve…there is no deadline, just a deadline to review).
3) Reset. Take a deep breath. Slow. Find relaxation tools. The goal is to reset. Flush it down the toilet. Get the monkey off your back.
4) Connect with other like minded athletes is helpful as long as they are the right athletes - those who empathize and understand. Other athletes who can relate. Read about athletes too. Deena Kastor’s book Let Your Mind Run is a great example of an athlete who came through a lot of struggles to eventually have a lot of success. Seeking out help from a mental performance coach or therapist if you’re needing help with this!
4) Refocus. Get another race on the calendar. Start implementing the changes that you identified are necessary. Build confidence builders into it. Smaller races. Training.
5) BE PATIENT. Look at the history of other runners and athletes. They did not achieve their goal over night. Sometimes they had failures time and time again prior to reaching their goal. In baseball it is part of the game, you can’t hit every pitch, and every pitch isn’t going to be a strike, the same with endurance sports. Every race isn’t going to be a PR. Every workout isn’t going to be better than the last.
6) Review your goals. Outcome goals are great to have but if we put all of our energy into the outcome then the process gets lost. Go back to the process. The outcome will arrive by working the goals that we can control.
If you feel stuck, get help! Seek out a mental performance coach or a therapist that specializes and has experience in working with athletes.
Fear of failure holds us back from life. Embracing failure will allow you to rise up to your greatest potential, it is a gift.