In the last edition of the Renegade I shared my experience of losing my business in 2007 and in this edition, I want to share some of the lessons I learned from that time and how I now see it as one of the greatest experiences of my life.
I like this quote from the greatest basketball player of all time, Michael Jordan: “I can accept failure; everyone fails at something. But what I can’t accept is not trying.”
When I left you last time it was 2010, I’d been kicking my own arse for the best part of 3 years and I was walking on that beautiful white sandy beach in Clearwater, Florida, on our first family holiday in a few years.
Every day, I used to take an hour and walk up and down the beach. It was a great way to shake off the boredom of lying in the sun and catch a few rays. It gave me some thinking time and that always resulted in me spending that “quality” time doing a great job of kicking my own arse and mentally abusing myself in my own head.
A few issues back our Renegade Read was Don Miguel Ruiz’s book The Four Agreements. I hadn’t come across this book before, but I loved the part when he talks about punishing ourselves for our mistakes over and over again in our own head. He says that we are our own Judge and Jury in our own heads, and we stand trial again and again for the same crime. I was definitely partaking in that.
On that day in 2010, I had my moment of clarity.
As I stood still there, on a quiet part of the beach, as a sole pelican dived for its dinner, I silenced that Judge and Jury.
The voice in my head that until then had been turned down or on full mute for many months shouted loudest: “Stop. Enough. Stop It. Enough. No More Arse Kicking. Its’ done – now move on”
The moment of crystal clarity.
There it was, forgiveness and that was it.
I can honestly remember it like it happened a few seconds ago. If I just think about it, I can relive every single moment. The sun, the sea, the view, the voice – everything.
I haven’t kicked myself anymore about that 2007 failure since that day in 2010. That was the moment I put it to bed and moved on.
It’s funny when I look back now, I look back with a different mind-set and it conjures a whole new raft of emotions and feelings.
Time is a great healer and reflection and awareness has changed how I feel about that time which I’ll talk about and elaborate on in greater detail again.
When I was going through those thoughts and in that time, I never thought I would snap out of it or be able to move on, but I did. In that one moment of clarity I was reborn and able to concentrate on the future and stick two fingers up at the past.
If that single moment hadn’t happened, I think I may have been lost forever and may never have come back. I don’t think my subsequent businesses would have worked and I don’t think I would have had the same outlook on failure as I do now.
“Failure is not final, it’s the courage to continue that counts” said Winston Churchill
That healing or forgiveness I think would never have happened if I hadn’t taken that downtime so my advice to every person that is going through that painful period after a business failure is to take some time, not a minute, an hour or a day but some real time to come to terms with the loss. Whether we like it or not, these businesses become like a part of the family, a loved one and many of us even refer to them as our “baby” and we probably need to mourn their loss properly.
I appreciate that may seem over dramatic or trivialising the real loss of a family member of child and that’s not what is meant in anyway. What we do need to do is appreciate the whole that the loss of a business leaves and more importantly the emotional toll that takes on us as individuals.
I remember a coaching session with my first ever coach and Linda was doing a great job of getting this out of me so I could actually move on. She was an incredibly successful business woman herself and she knew that, even though, a good length of time had passed, it was still in there, at the back, hidden and would make an appearance in my thinking every now and again.
I was still work in progress at that time and she said to me: “Steve, one day, you will look back on that time and the events of 2007 and you’ll think that it was the best time of your life”
Quite honestly, I think I could have thrown her out of the window at the time, it was still pretty raw and there wasn’t a window in the meeting room we were in anyway.
In all seriousness, I just didn’t know how she could say that or if I would ever get to that stage.
However, now I am at a place in my life where I totally understand and believe where she was coming from and what she was saying.
It was the best thing that ever happened to me – on a development, learning and experience basis (Meeting my wife, getting married and having Martha and Dan was far nicer and better than losing my business, my house and going bankrupt – but I think you get where I am coming from!!)
I never thought that experiencing that business failure and everything that went with it would give me the back bone and the experience for the credibility and success I have today.
Reflection and time will help you see things for what they are.
Failure is your friend and it definitely won’t kill you.
Give yourself that time that will allow you to reflect on the failure and make proper sense of it.
It will allow you to identify what was good and what was bad. What worked and what didn’t. More importantly it will allow you to make peace with yourself and forgive yourself and will without doubt tell you, in a loud voice. . . “Move the fuck on!!”
I hope this series of articles has managed to help you overcome some adversity or failure you may have experienced. If you are still coming to terms with it and would like some help, I’m always available, so just reach out on any of the forums or privately email me.
The quicker you can make peace and move on the sooner you can get on with achieving your goals and living the life you deserve.
