Why I Would Rather Live in Failure than Regret

At the end of the day, we all have a choice to make. To keep going or quit. Those are the only two options. We all can have many pivots along the way, where we quit something lesser to pursue something greater. But we never want to quit something greater to pursue nothing at all. I don’t want to live in the regret of giving up.

If you don’t quit, you win. Eventually. But, darn it all anyway, failure is hard.

Failure Is Hard

Doing what you’re called to do is hard. It can be scary. Stuff that should’ve worked, that seems to work for everybody else, doesn’t work. And with every failure, Imposter Syndrome shouts, “See, who are you to do this? It’ll never work. Stop embarrassing yourself.”

It doesn’t matter what you’re doing. You might not be starting an online business like me. Parenting is hard. Staying married is hard. Being a student is hard. Working a job is hard. Moving forward from trauma is hard.

Life is hard, if you’re doing anything worthwhile, anything that will make the world a better place. That could be speaking to thousands of people or raising one child. It’s all fraught with failure.

Failure is hard. And repeated failure is hard repeatedly. It can really wear you down.

Regret Is Easier

Living in regret is certainly easier. You’ve quit trying to do that big, hard thing. You can get comfortable and just get used to the idea that it never would have worked anyway. You can save your energy for comfortable things. Safe things. Boring things.

Living small is so much easier and less painful. You don’t have to endure the disappointment loop of continuing to try and watching it fail. Again.

Starting the Lawn Mower

Ever try to start the lawn mower the first time of the season, after a long winter? It can take a long time and a lot of persistence when the engine is cold and hasn’t been started for 3 months. You pull and pull that starter cord. And each time the engine sputters, and … doesn’t start.

After half a dozen times, you think something’s got to be wrong here. So you check the gas. You check the oil. All full and ready. You’re doing everything right. Why isn’t the darn engine starting?

Failure is so frustrating. Repeated failure is repeatedly frustrating.

All you can do is pull the cord again. How many pulls will it take? As many as it takes. You never know which pull will start the engine. Until it starts.

But you know one of these pulls will start the engine. And the truth is, the failed pulls weren’t failing, although it looked like it. Each pull warmed up the engine just a little bit more. And when the engine finally got warm enough, the next pull started it.

But it never would have started if you didn’t keep pulling.

Failure Is a Gift

A failure is not a failure when you learn from it. It’s a lesson. And lessons are gifts from God. Painful in the moment, but worth it in the end.

I’ve worked on technical computer research projects for TLAs (Three Letter Agencies). We got funded to try outside-the-box ideas that may or may not work. One of these research groups had the motto, “Negative results are just as important.” Because documenting those negative results saves the government considerable time and expense when other research teams don’t have to hit that same roadblock. So even if we didn’t get the results we wanted, if we learned the lesson, everybody wins.

Thomas Edison tried a thousand times to make a light bulb before he figured it out. He said, “I didn’t fail. I learned 999 ways not to make a light bulb.” But he only had to win once. So do you.

How I Keep Going with My Three Connections

When the failure gets overwhelmingly frustrating and discouraging, I keep going by staying deeply connected to My Three.

(1) Connection to My Jesus. When trying everything and failing gets the best of me, it’s usually because I’m out there trying it on my own. I’ve forgotten to partner with Jesus, my Lord and Savior, and my Friend, in everything. I have two yellow stickies on my computer monitor:

• “I will learn all the stuff and do all the things, but You have to make it work.” That’s our partnership.
• “Intimacy over Productivity. Intimacy First.” When increasing my productivity is not productive, I’ve learned I need to pause productivity and increase my intimacy.

(2) Connection to My Peeps. I maintain intentional connections with certain people I could never do this without.

• Janet. My wife is there for me when no one else is. She tells me things no one else will, things I need to hear. She hears the Holy Spirit really well. And every time we disagree, God is trying to tell me something. I have learned to value Janet’s words, ideas, and misgivings. Identity In Wholeness would not be possible without Janet.
• Other Online Entrepreneurs. When you’re doing something hard, you have to be around people doing the same thing. I meet regularly, on zoom, with friends and other entrepreneurs who are also trying to build their businesses online. Some are ahead of me and some behind. We all learn from each other’s lessons through our failures and successes. Sharing the journey is invaluable.

(3) Connection to My Why. I have another sticky note on my computer monitor: “Because God wants to partner with us to bring GA3.” (GA3 means the “Third Great Awakening.”) That’s why Janet and I do this. We are passionate about seeing the Body of Christ healthy and walking in wholeness. We are called to help Jesus prepare his Bride for the coming global revival. What an honor and privilege. That gets me out of bed in the morning.

Who are your Three? How is your connection to Jesus, fresh or stale? Who are your peeps who get what you’re doing? What is your why? Tell us in the comments.

So Dare Greatly

There is no knowing victory without knowing defeat. Teddy Roosevelt said it best:

“It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.” – Theodore Roosevelt, from a speech at Sorbonne, Paris, France, on April 23, 1910

So, yes, I would much rather live in continual failure than comfortable regret. Because eventually the engine will start.

Your Turn

Does this post resonate? How have you pushed through failure in the past? What did you learn? What are you trying to do now that isn’t working? Share your story and your lessons in the comments. And please share this post if it would bless others.