Pick yourself up: Failure is key to success

By Kassidy Tsikitas | Staff Writer

Most people have been through a series of events in life that had failure after failure. The word “failure” is often associated with the lack of success, but a lack of success can turn into achievements and lead to a better life.

Failure is the key to success in life. Jason Cope published an article on the ScienceDirect website called “Entrepreneurial learning from failure: An interpretative phenomenological analysis”.

“Failure represents one of the most difficult, complex and yet valuable learning experiences that entrepreneurs will ever have the (mis)fortune to engage in,” Cope said.

You learn from your mistakes to excel. Every routine needs trial and error. To learn from failures to get to the end goal, it takes time. Remember to enjoy the time where it’s OK to make so many mistakes.

Some days are better than others, whether it’s self-inflicted by following habits or if you have random luck. Failure is an element of life that’s important for everyone to have at least once.

My first experience with failure was when I got my first failing grade in elementary school. After that bad grade, I excelled in school and got an award for having perfect overall grades all year-round.

In this part of my life, I learned that sometimes you have to pick yourself up, because no one will do it for you. Work hard for whatever you want most.

One of my favorite things to go by is Murphy’s law: anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. This motto can actually be used in a positive sense to lighten your vision of the future. If you keep a positive mindset, you will get to your overall final product of success.

College students have the tendency to know what failure feels like.

Learning from failure can help you come up with a better schedule to make sure you study for all of your classes, and yes, even that one class you slack off in. Remember, it’s OK to fail in life. Failing and developing the needed skills to correct mistakes will be helpful in your future.

Another way to learn from failure is to participate in class. Whether you know the answer or not, it is a good idea to put the effort in.

Imagine: in the future, you’re in a meeting, the boss is yelling, everyone is quiet and making things worse. That is an embarrassing situation. Whereas, the class moment of you getting the answer wrong isn’t as humiliating, you won’t see those people ever again and, most likely, five other people were thinking the same thing as you.

Kassidy Tsikitas is a junior journalism major from New Jersey and a minor in film and digital media. In her third semester at the Lariat, she is excited to take on the role of Photo Editor. In her time here, she has learned the written and visual parts of a newspaper. She is most excited to take on a leadership role and learn new things.