Sign InMy Account

When You Fail

Posted By: Randy GageAugust 19, 2011

Last post I discussed how I like to paint myself in a corner for higher achievements and productivity.  Setting a high bar for yourself leads you to greater things.  But what happens when things don’t work as intended?  What happens when you really muck things up?

And we all sometimes muck things up…

And I don’t just mean missed deadlines or a failed project.  I’m talking about when your business goes bankrupt, you relapse on an addiction, or hurt someone you love.  What do you do then?

People sometimes think because I teach prosperity I must have it all together.  Now that’s funny.

Reminds me of a fascinating question on this blog a few weeks back.  Someone asked how a spiritual leader they had been following could develop cancer.  Someone else picked up the discussion and related seeing a well-known self-development speaker who also has cancer and was overweight.

Well that’s the problem with humans.  They’re human.  But that’s also their greatest gift.  I can tell you personally I have learned a lot more from my failures than I have from my successes.  That’s probably true for you as well.  Challenge, adversity, and even failure can lead to greater transformation.

Even with all that magic, Harry Potter still needs eyeglasses!

When I fall short of what I am capable of, I take faith in Romans 8:28 – “All things work together for those who love God.”  I remember that it’s all God and it’s all good.

You don’t have to understand it all completely.  Maybe none of us really do.  But you can have faith in the knowledge that every chapter of your life is part of your unfolding.  It’s part of your process of evolvement, growing and learning; part of becoming the person you are meant to be.  And that is the journey of being a human.

-RG

26 comments on “When You Fail”

  1. I get it, embrace my failures, study them and learn from them but not programming myself to work towards them.

  2. Oh, I Just love it!

    Thanks, Randy!

    I was thinking about this for a while. About being perfect..and being a human. And I realized, that it would be too boring to be perfect...No great goals, no great achievements - everything would seem ordinary)))

  3. Whatever mistakes we may make in this journey called life, we have the power to choose. The beauty is that we can still CHOOSE how to react to what is manifested. Whether we ACCEPT FATE or TAKE ACTION, both will serve our highest good. Perhaps there is nothing that is not good. In the case of Harry Potter, perhaps wearing glasses is 'accepting fate' but the glasses actually enhances his looks.

  4. See that story a week or so ago... a 9 year old Seattle girl with a true giving heart, didn't even want a birthday present, created a fund to build wells in Africa... the one person in a car crash that gets killed... first I thought, Oh man, thanks a lot God" but... the publicity has taken her fund over a million dollars now... ours is not to question why...

  5. It's interesting to me how many think that spirituality is supposed to "save" you from adversity. To me, spirituality is an ongoing process, an awareness that allows you to deal with whatever comes and extract meaning consistently.

    Failure is simply a door you walk through on your way to success. Spirituality helps remind me of that fact and allows me to "keep it movin'."

      1. You know, that reminds me of what my niece told me just recently.

        Months ago, my niece and I did something I forget now, got it right, then she remarked, "Practice makes perfect!" I asked where she learned that, and she said she got that in school.

        Then I recalled what Les Brown said: practice makes improvement. I asked my niece something like, "But nobody's perfect, right?"

        She frowned for a moment, then said yes. Then I followed up like, "OTOH, how about practice makes improvement? Does that sound better?"

        She looked excitedly at me and said yes again. And the rest went on.

        Then around last week when I saw her again, she told me she shared that "practice makes improvement" saying with her teacher. It turned out they shared that saying among others in school, finally adopted that instead of practice-makes-perfect, and some people and things have improved in some ways.

        Can't remember the specifics, but that's about the gist of it. 🙂

  6. It reminds me of Eleanor Roosevelt's saying, "He who loses friends loses much. He who loses money, loses more. He who loses Faith, loses all".

    Yes, there are always challenges in Life and as you've said before, it's how we respond to them that matters most. But beyond all this, we must always maintain our Faith and Purpose. And as Wattles says in the Science of Getting Rich, "..the key is holding the thought, The Truth, in SPITE of all appearances.." In other words maintain our Faith.

    Thanks Randy.

  7. Love this post. I think we all tend to focus on our own outcomes and expectations, which usually fall short, even if we meet them, of what value we placed on the outcome in the first place. All things work for good, ultimately. Good works will always bring a blessing, even if it's not in the package we expected and on the time frame we demanded. We are all works in progress and that is why I constantly develop forgiving and judgement. None of us has a clean track record, or always will, going forward. As long as I continually ask God to grow my heart, life keeps getting better and better.

  8. I don't know if it's true, but if it so that the most authentic we as humans can get, is to be authentic about our inauthenticities, the game to look perfect is wasted effort. We are the most human and loving when we dare disclose the layers of looking good.
    I experience much relatedness to you in this blog post Randy.

    Love and Respect - Pierre Leyssac, cph

    1. - read below in the later responses for the link to this my second respons -

      Randy what in this blog so resonated with me? I went back and read: "But you can have faith in the knowledge that every chapter of your life is part of your unfolding". I experienced you wrote directly to you Randy. That, I got, is when you hit your readers.

      Atlas Shrugged is in three parts:
      NON-CONTRADICTION, EITHER-OR, A IS A.

      The enlightened. Is that an end? Seems to me to subtract from productivity to believe so.
      When present to contradictions, I check my premises. That's the intellectual effort worth living for. Faced with the appearance of contradictions, I believe there's some communication that were avoided or not extended to it's absolute. Beyond the obstacle there's only: the highest good for all.

      LOVE
      Pierre Leyssac, cph

  9. Hi Randy,
    Everything happens for a reason, for our highest good.. A failure can be an opportunity to recreate yourself in the image of who you really are. Of course, if you want to see it that way.
    You can't know how good is to be up..if you're never been down...
    Thanks for the inspiration!

    Radu

  10. Hey Randy,
    It's true that we are all human and we do learn and grow the most after our major screw-ups.

    I once believed that personal development and spiritual masters all had their stuff together.

    Now I realize that they are just as human as me.

  11. Hi Randy,

    I once read that the degree to which a being is enlightened is the degree to which they are comfortable with their contradictions.

    Think about that one for a while, and we'll be more likely to see ourselves as HUMANS. Even though we are unlimited awareness, we still live in a human body, with feelings, and emotions, and all that good stuff which moves us into certain vibes which causes us to err. And even when we seem to align ourselves perfectly, the Universe still leaves failure on our doorstep. Why? Who the hell knows, but the Universe?

    I write inspirational quotes. You RT'ed one of them the other day 😉 300 of these quotes came to me during an hour or two, when I was depressed as hell, and borderline suicidal. I was broken down to the point where I was open and receptive to Universal Intelligence like no other point in my life, and the stream of quotes hit me non-stop over a few hours.

    We learn the most from failure, or heartaches, or when life doesn't seem worth living, for these periods introduce Mr. or Mrs. Lower Self to Mr. or Mrs. Higher Self, if we are ready and open for that wonderful introduction.

    Thanks Randy, keep on spreading the word!

    RB

  12. Randy,

    Thank you for this discussion. During this journey I have learned that both my successes and failures and all that is in between are not solo experiences. I learned humility by not taking full credit for my successes, and I have learned grace, by knowing that my failures are all part of a greater and dare I say, perfect collective unfolding. In a way, success and failure has been too binary a lense for me to look through during our shared unfolding.

    Randy, thank you once again!

    All my best,

    Erik

  13. Huh...I haven't used the word 'muck' when I 'muck' something up. My word of choice involves an 'f' but the sentence is always followed up with, 'My life unfolds in divine perfection' so the failure doesn't get all my attention! Not always easy but true. Everything happens as it should for us to continue learning.

  14. This is a great post Mr. Randy Gage. I love that you used Romans 8:28 and when I'm feeling where I am going down and hit a bit from failing.

    I turn to John 14:1 LET NOT your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. I'm glad you wrote a post today about failing, because it is important to address this situation.

    When you know that failure sometimes happens, you get over the perfect deal and just do the best that you can. I understand how that is Mr. Gage! Once again
    great post and God bless you Sir.

  15. Failure is just our minds stuck in the past. If we can be totally present, we can realise that we may have "missed" the target we hoped to hit quite alright, but we are now this moment, even in a better position to hit since we have learnt how not to miss it from our failure.

  16. nice post. we're all still growing inside and out. funny thing is we always will be so all us humans should learn to enjoy the ride before the end, because we only have one ticket. take care

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


Warning: Undefined variable $key in /nas/content/live/randygagedev/wp-content/plugins/honeypot-comments/honeypot-comments.php on line 63

  • Stay Connected

    Subscribe to Randy’s Blog via Email

  • Recent Posts

  • 26 comments on “When You Fail”

    1. I get it, embrace my failures, study them and learn from them but not programming myself to work towards them.

    2. Oh, I Just love it!

      Thanks, Randy!

      I was thinking about this for a while. About being perfect..and being a human. And I realized, that it would be too boring to be perfect...No great goals, no great achievements - everything would seem ordinary)))

    3. Whatever mistakes we may make in this journey called life, we have the power to choose. The beauty is that we can still CHOOSE how to react to what is manifested. Whether we ACCEPT FATE or TAKE ACTION, both will serve our highest good. Perhaps there is nothing that is not good. In the case of Harry Potter, perhaps wearing glasses is 'accepting fate' but the glasses actually enhances his looks.

    4. See that story a week or so ago... a 9 year old Seattle girl with a true giving heart, didn't even want a birthday present, created a fund to build wells in Africa... the one person in a car crash that gets killed... first I thought, Oh man, thanks a lot God" but... the publicity has taken her fund over a million dollars now... ours is not to question why...

    5. It's interesting to me how many think that spirituality is supposed to "save" you from adversity. To me, spirituality is an ongoing process, an awareness that allows you to deal with whatever comes and extract meaning consistently.

      Failure is simply a door you walk through on your way to success. Spirituality helps remind me of that fact and allows me to "keep it movin'."

        1. You know, that reminds me of what my niece told me just recently.

          Months ago, my niece and I did something I forget now, got it right, then she remarked, "Practice makes perfect!" I asked where she learned that, and she said she got that in school.

          Then I recalled what Les Brown said: practice makes improvement. I asked my niece something like, "But nobody's perfect, right?"

          She frowned for a moment, then said yes. Then I followed up like, "OTOH, how about practice makes improvement? Does that sound better?"

          She looked excitedly at me and said yes again. And the rest went on.

          Then around last week when I saw her again, she told me she shared that "practice makes improvement" saying with her teacher. It turned out they shared that saying among others in school, finally adopted that instead of practice-makes-perfect, and some people and things have improved in some ways.

          Can't remember the specifics, but that's about the gist of it. 🙂

    6. It reminds me of Eleanor Roosevelt's saying, "He who loses friends loses much. He who loses money, loses more. He who loses Faith, loses all".

      Yes, there are always challenges in Life and as you've said before, it's how we respond to them that matters most. But beyond all this, we must always maintain our Faith and Purpose. And as Wattles says in the Science of Getting Rich, "..the key is holding the thought, The Truth, in SPITE of all appearances.." In other words maintain our Faith.

      Thanks Randy.

    7. Love this post. I think we all tend to focus on our own outcomes and expectations, which usually fall short, even if we meet them, of what value we placed on the outcome in the first place. All things work for good, ultimately. Good works will always bring a blessing, even if it's not in the package we expected and on the time frame we demanded. We are all works in progress and that is why I constantly develop forgiving and judgement. None of us has a clean track record, or always will, going forward. As long as I continually ask God to grow my heart, life keeps getting better and better.

    8. I don't know if it's true, but if it so that the most authentic we as humans can get, is to be authentic about our inauthenticities, the game to look perfect is wasted effort. We are the most human and loving when we dare disclose the layers of looking good.
      I experience much relatedness to you in this blog post Randy.

      Love and Respect - Pierre Leyssac, cph

      1. - read below in the later responses for the link to this my second respons -

        Randy what in this blog so resonated with me? I went back and read: "But you can have faith in the knowledge that every chapter of your life is part of your unfolding". I experienced you wrote directly to you Randy. That, I got, is when you hit your readers.

        Atlas Shrugged is in three parts:
        NON-CONTRADICTION, EITHER-OR, A IS A.

        The enlightened. Is that an end? Seems to me to subtract from productivity to believe so.
        When present to contradictions, I check my premises. That's the intellectual effort worth living for. Faced with the appearance of contradictions, I believe there's some communication that were avoided or not extended to it's absolute. Beyond the obstacle there's only: the highest good for all.

        LOVE
        Pierre Leyssac, cph

    9. Hi Randy,
      Everything happens for a reason, for our highest good.. A failure can be an opportunity to recreate yourself in the image of who you really are. Of course, if you want to see it that way.
      You can't know how good is to be up..if you're never been down...
      Thanks for the inspiration!

      Radu

    10. Hey Randy,
      It's true that we are all human and we do learn and grow the most after our major screw-ups.

      I once believed that personal development and spiritual masters all had their stuff together.

      Now I realize that they are just as human as me.

    11. Hi Randy,

      I once read that the degree to which a being is enlightened is the degree to which they are comfortable with their contradictions.

      Think about that one for a while, and we'll be more likely to see ourselves as HUMANS. Even though we are unlimited awareness, we still live in a human body, with feelings, and emotions, and all that good stuff which moves us into certain vibes which causes us to err. And even when we seem to align ourselves perfectly, the Universe still leaves failure on our doorstep. Why? Who the hell knows, but the Universe?

      I write inspirational quotes. You RT'ed one of them the other day 😉 300 of these quotes came to me during an hour or two, when I was depressed as hell, and borderline suicidal. I was broken down to the point where I was open and receptive to Universal Intelligence like no other point in my life, and the stream of quotes hit me non-stop over a few hours.

      We learn the most from failure, or heartaches, or when life doesn't seem worth living, for these periods introduce Mr. or Mrs. Lower Self to Mr. or Mrs. Higher Self, if we are ready and open for that wonderful introduction.

      Thanks Randy, keep on spreading the word!

      RB

    12. Randy,

      Thank you for this discussion. During this journey I have learned that both my successes and failures and all that is in between are not solo experiences. I learned humility by not taking full credit for my successes, and I have learned grace, by knowing that my failures are all part of a greater and dare I say, perfect collective unfolding. In a way, success and failure has been too binary a lense for me to look through during our shared unfolding.

      Randy, thank you once again!

      All my best,

      Erik

    13. Huh...I haven't used the word 'muck' when I 'muck' something up. My word of choice involves an 'f' but the sentence is always followed up with, 'My life unfolds in divine perfection' so the failure doesn't get all my attention! Not always easy but true. Everything happens as it should for us to continue learning.

    14. This is a great post Mr. Randy Gage. I love that you used Romans 8:28 and when I'm feeling where I am going down and hit a bit from failing.

      I turn to John 14:1 LET NOT your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. I'm glad you wrote a post today about failing, because it is important to address this situation.

      When you know that failure sometimes happens, you get over the perfect deal and just do the best that you can. I understand how that is Mr. Gage! Once again
      great post and God bless you Sir.

    15. Failure is just our minds stuck in the past. If we can be totally present, we can realise that we may have "missed" the target we hoped to hit quite alright, but we are now this moment, even in a better position to hit since we have learnt how not to miss it from our failure.

    16. nice post. we're all still growing inside and out. funny thing is we always will be so all us humans should learn to enjoy the ride before the end, because we only have one ticket. take care

    Leave a Reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *


    Warning: Undefined variable $key in /nas/content/live/randygagedev/wp-content/plugins/honeypot-comments/honeypot-comments.php on line 63

    © MMXXIII Prosperity Factory, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Legal Information, Sitemap, Site by PrimeConcepts