Salvation
So, to my usual readers, this isn’t my usual Data structures and Algorithms blog which I used to write. Rather this is going to be a blog where I talk about my personal experiences with facing failure and setbacks in life for the last couple of years or so.
A little detour on what exactly happened that once seemed like career enders for me. The first one happened back in 2019 when I failed every entrance exam I gave over a period of time. It wasn’t like I was underprepared prepared or anything, it was more on the pressure that I had put myself on clearing those exams, which meant everything to me at that point in time of my life. This one was the hardest hit that I had taken until this moment in my life, I was devastated for months, then I slowly bounced back with the help of a friend to whom I haven’t even talked for a long time back then. That friend helped me to get through my struggles and see the light of the day again.
The next one was during my 3rd year in college. At this point, I would like to think I was quite well prepared for any interviews if I had to face one. Then came the day, I failed to clear the 2nd round of the first company which had visited our college that year. It wouldn’t have mattered to me if it was the final HR round where I had failed a behavioral round(as I consider myself a very closed person who finds it difficult to open up to people). But the round which I failed to clear was a technical HR round, this one was again a strong blowback because it made me develop imposter syndrome. This led me to give up on development and blogging for a long time. I didn’t work on any web-development projects for the next 6 months and even if I had started anything new I didn’t find the enthusiasm to continue it like I used to.
Eventually, I did find my way back, but still, I struggle a little bit to overcome some challenges that the two incidents caused me. So, here are a few personal pieces of advice that I would like to share to overcome setbacks and failures in life, which helped me to overcome this stressful period in my life:
1. Take time to heal
It’s okay to slow down a little and give yourself time to deal with your emotions, after a rejection. To put it into simple words, rejection stings! So, get help from your support system and take some time off your personal routine. This might look like a pointless digress and escapist attitude, but pushing your emotions away will result in them bubbling to the surface at a later time which may cause adverse effects on your mental health. Neglecting this and throwing yourself right back at where you left off may lead to more careless errors and loss of momentum by not giving yourself to lick your wounds.
2. Evaluate your mistakes and learn from them
Sometimes you have to take a step back to move forward. Take some time to analyze and evaluate what really went wrong time the last time which led to the step back. You can learn from your mistakes, there is no greater resource to learn from than mistakes. The quote from Hendry Ford, summarize this idea better than any other:
The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.
3. Come to terms with what’s in your control and what isn’t
Sometimes things don’t go as you expect them to work out. No need to beat yourself up over things you can’t influence or control. So, what’s in your control then, your attitude, aspirations, dreams, goals, effort and etc., We can have a positive attitude towards failure and put in the effort to become so good, that they can’t reject us the next time. The things which aren’t in your control are the external factors that influence the outcome. For example, when we take an example of a job hunt, company policies with employee referrals, budget realignments, hiring freezes and etc., are really not in our hands to influence these factors which may contribute to the outcome that we yearn for. Here is a quote from a character from a game that I used to play, that really summarizes this idea:
‘Control what you can control.’ I used to say that to stay focused on what was in my power. And to let go of what wasn’t.
4. Finding or remembering your why?
What is the reason that motivates you to work tirelessly towards your passion? What is the reason that drives you to take risks which you wouldn’t normally? Finding our why is a major turn in how we approach our problems in our daily life. There are many factors that might motivate us like reading motivational quotes or instances from some books, watching some motivational movies, appreciation from peers or the people you admire or aspire to become like and etc., These factors work out some magic and make you fall in love with pursuing your goals but these are temporary, this excitement/adrenaline rush wanes out in the due period of time. So, your why must be a strong factor that keeps you focused on it which motivates and drives you to strive for success.
One personal piece of advice, don’t plan on making revenge as your why as this leads you to a path that is morally wrong. I would like to quote Shannon Sharpe here,
“Don’t worry about proving somebody wrong, prove yourself right.”
5. Getting back to the hunt
Now that the initial phase of pain has subsided and you’ve found your why it’s time to get back on the hunt. It’s okay to make mistakes and stumble on your paths once again, but this time you’re going to learn from the mistakes and remember your why, what is the reason that drives us to work towards betterment tirelessly. I would like to leave with one of my favorite quotes from my idol, Muhammad Ali:
So, we have come to the end of this post, and thank you so much 😊 if you have made it this far into this post. I have written this post based on what I’ve experienced throughout the past couple of years, so it’s up to you what to take on and what to leave from this post. I do hope it helps someone out there who has lost his or her hope and trying to rebound back in their life. Before logging out check back with the very first quote by Marcus Aurelius from this blog 😄.
Note
- As a reading recommendation, I would like to suggest the ‘Alchemist’ which is one of the most memorable books that I had came across during this period of time.
- If you’re someone who is into anime, then I would like to suggest watching ‘March Comes In Like a Lion’ / ‘ Sangatsu no Lion’, which deals with a teenager who is a shogi prodigy but who faces internal struggles and how he eventually learns to overcome his challenges that he had faced in his life.
