For some people, talking about their biggest failures in life could induce an avalanche of embarrassment and re-lived pain. But, for Elizabeth Day, It is almost necessary to address our failures in life, as in her own words " learning how to fail is actually learning how to succeed better".
It was only a few hours ago that I turned the last page of Elizabeth Day's Book ' How To Fail' and as I write this I am crouched up on my bed, listening to Dolly Alderton's interview with Elizabeth on the podcast, that inspired the book, sipping on a 3 for £5 can of an 'All shook up' Pornstar Martini. I would also like to point out, that I am not much of a casual drinker in all honestly, I am too lazy to walk downstairs and get an actual hydrating drink.
With this is mind, along with the fact that I am nineteen years old, having left college just last year, I don't feel as though I am entirely qualified to advice people on how to overcome the failures they have faced, but I do feel as though I can, and should, add to the conversation, as much as anyone else can.
We have all failed and we haven't all admitted this. I have funnily enough tended to joke about being a failure with my friends having over used the joke 'Emily failure' as it rhymes with my surname and I remember a snotty boy in primary school inventing the name at an attempt to offend me. Despite this, I have struggled to immediately conjure up a specific failure of my own.
I can think of silly failures from my childhood like forgetting to put on a pair of pants when dressing myself that day and deciding to do a cartwheel at a designer outlet, revealing my pre-pubescent vagina. But all I learnt from that was to never forget to wear knickers, or on the occasion I may free myself from the restriction of cotton and lace, to not cartwheel in public. I think cartwheeling in public at nineteen in itself would not be widely accepted. I can think of the time where I took it upon myself to enter the school talent show, singing my own rendition of ' Butterly Fly Away' from Hannah Montana and placing third. It may have even been second. Either way I was convinced I was going to win because my parents were very keen to tell me I was amazing and I suppose I leant from that to not get so bloody cocky.
A failure that I often refer back to and play back in my mind, links in with Elizabeth's chapter on 'How to fail at relationships'. Without going into too much gritty detail, as it’s not just my story to tell and I wouldn't want anyone involved to feel as though I have been too intrusive on their past, I definitely, at the ripe age of fifteen, failed at a relationship, but more specifically failed to be honest.
I would, before I touch on this, like to personally apologise to any of my girlfriends and current boyfriend who may be reading this, as they all lived through the tale with me and are definitely sick to death of hearing about it. Love you all!!
When I had my first boyfriend at fifteen, it was the kind of relationship where you just discover the excitement of intimacy but not quite reached full sexual maturity just yet. It was all very innocent and sweet, kisses behind trees and not telling his parents for the first six months. In the end, I cheated on him, the way all fifteen year old's do, by kissing another boy at a house party after a few too many strawberry and lime Kopparberg's. Not just any boy of course, my now boyfriend of three years and so not entirely a failure.
My failure to be honest about what I'd done became, what felt like at the time, absolutely catastrophic. I was so good at pretending and yet it would slowly eat away at me, chipping away at any last ounce of respect I had for myself and completely abolishing my trust in my own decisions. I was so good at lying, and keeping this secret, that I convinced myself that it never happened. But as the story goes, my lies caught up with me, as they always do and of course, he later found out.
This is definitely a long story cut short, but to this day I cannot explain the shear amount of guilt and shame ( two of the worst feelings in the world) that I felt as a fifteen year old, discovering what it was like to kiss boys and smell Dior 's 'Sauvage' for the first time. I can still smell it from a mile away.
There were plenty of repercussions to this failure of course. The reputation I had built for myself which, to a fifteen year old, is absolutely crucial to your existence, until you leave school and then it isn't. The loss of friendships, which I am now so grateful for, because I have amazing people in my life and couldn't imagine anyone else filling their shoes. Lastly, of course, my first ever failed relationship.
Now for the important part: what I learnt from this that helped me succeed better. I never lied ever again, happily ever after, the end. TAH DAH. If only it was that easy. I made a similar mistake, a failure if you will, during the early stages of my next relationship, the 'no labels, let’s just see where it goes despite us both being very clear that we love and want to be with each other' stage and yet this time it was very different.
I told myself that pretending it didn't happen won’t make the guilt and the shame go away. It will gobble you up until you burst and the longer you stash your lies away, the harder the repercussions tend to me. So the next day, I came clean. I knew that there was the biggest chance that in telling the truth I was about to risk not being loved by someone who I had always wanted to be loved by. But I also knew, that it was the right thing to do.
Since, 3 years on, I feel as though honesty is the pillar in every relationship whether that be platonic or romantic. Being honest about your actions, about your emotions not only lifts what feels like the weight of the world from your shoulders, but gives that person the respect that they deserve. To hear it from you, good or bad.
I would like to make it clear that I am sure the result of my failure had much harder outcomes for the parties involved and I understand now also having learnt from this failure that a thousand apologies could never make someone forgive you, and that is ok. They are within their right to not want to be with you or have you in their life or accept your actions with grace. You cannot control the outcome, but again, this is what helps us all learn and succeed later on in life.
I hope that you all manage to get your hands on a copy of this book as it feels vital to understanding the importance of the universal feeling of failure. I am almost certain that from here on onwards I will be diving deep into the archives of the podcast 'How to fail with Elizabeth Day' and become OBSSESED with it, the same way in which Dolly Alderton is obsessed with Desert Island Discs.
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