Fail Early, Fail Often, Fail Forward

Fail early, fail often, fail forward sounds a lot more inspiring and motivating coming from someone like Will smith than actually experiencing it In real life. 

 I decided strongly that I would enter the world of being an entrepreneur after sitting and listening to a wealthy man talk about the impact he was able to make in peoples lives using the power of money. And my epiphany was that money is a phenomenal tool that can be used for good or for evil, depending on the tools wielder. 

In all honesty, I was one of the good guys, so if money is the light saber then I was joining the Jedi. And, much like a Jedi, I was going to have to train to get where I wanted to be; except, I had no one nearly as cool as Yoda to help me harness my skills and inner power. 

So what did I do? 

I failed early, and boy did I fail Often, but in the end… I failed Forward! Regardless, failing FU**%$# sucks!  It’s scary as hell, it’s crazy stressful and sometimes it takes you out for a moment. 

Im not talking about a product launch type of failure. You have to suck that up and keep moving forward, that’s not true failure, that’s just an obstacle to overcome. When i’m talking about failure, i’m talking about your company being liquidated and shut down by creditors, losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in savings in a month, filing bankruptcy, adding tangible weight of stress and anxiety to your household. And the worst part is out come the know it all friends and family members that  “knew you shouldn’t have done that, or started that.” Suddenly everyone turns into the worlds best business consultant. Thank’s Tony Robbins, but your advice isn’t needed now, it’s over I failed! 

When you truly fail, your mind starts racing, going over all of the possible what ifs, what could have beens. How do you get back all of that time that you spent on business instead of family and fun? You spent the last 7 years planning something and it was going so freaking well, then BAM, it crumbles like the Buffalo Bills in the super bowl. WHAT THE HELL?! Will Smith didn’t say it was going to hurt like this! I wouldn’t have minded skipping the failure part of entrepreneurship, to be completely honest. To have had no money, to feel like a loser, and to have zero idea where to even start to claw your way back??? 

But it’s true, in those moments, at that time, you are becoming battle hardened. Stripped of all your accolades and atta boys…Staring failure in the face, you realize WHO YOU REALLY ARE. You realize that no matter how hard you were hit, or how hard you fell you are still the same hustling fool. The grit, determination, and drive you had before, that got you where you were… they are still there, only amplified!  Now, you may be experiencing a lot of things, but by God quit isn’t one of them. You hear the quote from Sylvester Stallone ringing in your head, 

“It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done! Now, if you know what you're worth, then go out and get what you're worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain't you. You're better than that!” 

The Sylvester Stallone quote might just come from the Rocky fan in me. But when you experience true failure, life altering failure. Don’t sit and dwell on the what could’ve beens. Thats all theory anyway, you cant truly say what could’ve or would’ve  happened. The truth is, you just got your As$ whooped. And you just experienced the education of a lifetime. You know things college, books, podcasts, and all the crappy online courses in the world could never teach. You don’t have head knowledge, you have the best kind of experiential knowledge money can buy, you’ve got Fail knowledge. And in my case it was pretty expensive. You have to see failure as the beginning and the middle, but never entertain it as an end. 

You pick yourself up because no one else will, so don’t expect them too. When you fail, no one is coming to save you. Not the government, nor your parents. You are going to have to see yourself, and that starts when you focus and remind yourself about who you are and remember why you started.

Here are my tips, guide, or whatever you like to call it, but here is how I pulled myself outta the hell others call failure. 

Shut out the “you should’ve” people 

Everyone becomes a business consultant and wants to add their 2 cents on why you failed. They often think they are helping, but they aren’t. All it is doing is adding to your self doubt and building a more clouded judgment of your past and future. Shut it down, you cant afford to not have as clear a head as possible in this moment. 

Remember

Remember, you only failed because you were in a high enough position to consider it a failure. Remember and remind yourself of all of your successes You aren’t defined by this small moment of failure. Your character and who you are remains. Your entrepreneurial traits and qualities and your strengths weren’t taken from you. You did it once and you can do it again, and this time? This time you’re coming back stonier than ever. 

Don’t dwell on the haters 

Im all for letting haters fuel you. It inspired our Popular shirt, Turn Haters into motivators. However, haters cannot be your “why” . Im going to repeat that, haters cannot be your “why.” It’s true that you are going to have haters, but most of the time people flatter themselves too quickly. You can't call someone who doesn’t believe in you a “hater” they just simply don’t have the confidence in you that you do. Thats what 99% of people experience. They think just because someone isn’t their cheerleader that they are a hater. Listen, people that don’t believe in you amount to almost everyone! And the truth is, most will eventually believe in you when they see you have success. It’s happened countless times with me. What happens to your “why” and your fuel when everyone is now a super-fan??  Your WHY has to be way deeper than an old high school buddy telling you he doesn’t think your business venture is the best idea. Don’t create something that isn’t real, because it wont last. 

Reflect 

My mom taught me something that I equate to most of my success. She said:

“no matter what, always be honest with yourself.”

So many people have an issue with this and the worst part is they don’t know it. Figure out why you failed. Think past the hurt and insecurities. Some of the best and most valuable information is locked away in these memories. We didn’t fail because of others, that’s a dangerous path to take. You don’t want to give others credit for your success…so don’t start giving them credit for your failure. 

“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure”

Colin Powell 

Reevaluate & Discover 

Take a moment after experiencing your failure, and before you run rampant again and start crushing it, take a second and take a breathe. You have an incredible opportunity to start over, and you can do anything you want. Choose something that you want to spend the rest of your life doing. Make sure it is your passion, because it may get worse before it gets better. So you need to be certain you’re willing to fight for this hope and dream again. Because you don’t want to waste more time. The worst thing is giving another year towards something you hate and realizing it’s time to start over again. So take a moment, don’t simply choose your dream, discover it. 

“You are capable of more than you know. Choose a goal that seems right for you and strive to be the best, however hard the path. Aim high. Behave honorably. Prepare to be alone at times, and to endure failure. Persist! The world needs all you can give.”

E.O. Wilson

Dont just be motivated, be disciplined.

Once you have a new project that you are passionate about, be disciplined.  Motivation is fickle, and even when you are passionate, it will fail at times.  When this happens, you can’t just mail it in. It’s your ability to grind through the times when you don’t feel motivated that will lead to your success. 

An artist who only writes when they feel motivated isn’t going to write every often, and their productivity is probably going to suck. It is often the most prolific person who is the most successful, not the most talented.

My advice to you is to write down one key thing that you need to do every day. One important task that, even if It was the only thing you did that day, if completed would move you closer to your goal. 

Now make sure that no matter what, before your head hits that pillow, that you knocked that one thing out. Some days you may knock 10 things out, but every day you knock this 1 out. This ensures that even if every other thing you did that day was a string of failures, you accomplished the 1 most important thing for the day.

This little step of 1 goal completed, no matter what, provides the discipline to fail forward no matter what, even when motivation is long gone.

Listen, behind every great entrepreneur is a great string of failures. I failed, and I will fail again… and so will you. And the results are simply the battle scars of entrepreneurship. Just remember that when you do fail, you have that innate drive that all entrepreneurs have. It can’t be bought, it’s a calling, (I think a gift) and you and I both have it. And when you have this gift, the only thing that can prevent you from being a truly successful entrepreneur is you, when you stop believing in yourself. Once that happens you will simply fail. You wont fail forward, you will just fail. 

So, keep believing in yourself, and I will do the same. Be DTRMND to succeed, and keep failing forward.

-Dalton Mixon 

Serial Entrepreneur