Dealing with a Sense of Failure

[Excerpt from upcoming book, Spiritual Influence: The Hidden Power Behind Leadership]

When we are honest we will admit to God and to the appropriate people in our lives when we have failed. There is just no reason to hold back—though almost every one of us does. (This is not to say that one’s failures are everybody’s business. Discretion must go hand-in-hand with confession.) Pretending we are something that we are not simply sets us up for the most devastating failure of all—some calamitous fall because of pride.

But on the other hand there is this problem: when we live with a constant sense of inadequacy, guilt, and failure, we are hobbled. We should have humility, but we cannot lead out of a sense of humiliation. “Failure” is not supposed to be an identity.

And as if this isn’t complicated enough, some leaders who feel profoundly insecure compensate with a forced self-confidence. It is the worst of both worlds: inadequacy clothed in bravado. It may be more common than any of us imagine.

Here are some practical steps in dealing with a pervasive sense of failure:

When we know that we are recovering from some significant failure on our part, we should accept the embarrassment and self-disappointment, but process what happened with trusted friends, coworkers, mentors, or other counselors. It might be helpful for us to think of this like a grief process. Ecclesiastes 7:2–4 talks about going into “the house of mourning” for a season. It is not where we are meant to live permanently, but it is the appropriate state of mind while we work through the sense of loss that always accompanies failure.

When we are coming through failure, we should turn this period into a time of learning. The wisest and best leaders have learned from their mistakes instead of denying them. It is painful when we review a time of failure, especially as it uncovers our own shortcomings. But when we do so, with other people who are fair-minded, trustworthy, and perceptive, we will be in a better state to move on.

Learn caution through failure, but do not become overly cautious. There is a fine balance here. Some failures teach us where we were careless, overly ambitious, or overconfident, and so the failure teaches us to rein ourselves in. But if we play it too safe as we move ahead, then the failure has effectively shut us down.

When we have a sense of failure but other people we trust assure us that it is just our self-perception, not based in reality, then we have to figure out where that insecurity is coming from. It may come from a string of disappointments that have produced a pervasive sense of nervousness. It may come from experiences in an entirely different area of life—like a leader struggling in a marriage—and that results in a sense of failure everywhere. Sometimes insecurity is a matter of temperament. It has been there all along, lurking under the surface. [To be continued…]

[from Spiritual Influence: The Hidden Power Behind Leadership]

What do you think?