A latent fear - The individual and failure

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Failure, a term that frightens us, there are very few movies or stories that show us how his protagonist fails, most of the time we like to consume those stories that sell us the idea that if we have many failures corresponds to us as a work of magic to reach success, but as always, reality is quite different from what we would like it to be. Sometimes the pursuit of pleasures, of an endless smile, of an unlimited romanticism, through those stories that make us feel good, that make us believe that failure is just one more step to achieve success is inevitable.

The mistake is made to believe that the whole reality is in a specific way, just to take into account some exceptional cases, for example, cases where certain subjects say that despite having failed many times they finally achieved success, and to know these stories we usually ignore that there were other hundreds of thousands of subjects who failed, and did not fail because they did not make enough effort, but because of how complex reality becomes.

First of all, we have to take into account that total failure exist, ideas and projects that will not work, because there are things that are practically impossible, ideas that are far from reality, and businesses that will never work, so we must keep in mind that failure is usually there before you even start.

What exactly is failure?

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Certainly you can resort to a quick definition of failure, but since we know how complex the social web is, we should think that failure contains a bit more complexity compared to a short dictionary definition.

Failure is a term that changes depending on time and society, for example, in a medieval society in Europe, a poor person would be considered successful due to his monitoring of Christian morality, making the ultimate goal was to reach paradise, leaving on the other hand the concept of success that we handle today, one that is directly related to acquiring as many and as many stimuli as possible, and being recognized in all types of social circles.

On the other hand, the closest definition of success for the Greco-Roman Stoics was a life of self-control, where wealth meant an obstacle to virtue.

The current vision of success is about competitiveness, a game in which you must be the winner. For much of Western society, failure is those things that do not allow the individual to live "the good life", a concept of success that arises from the constant bombardment of large advertising machines, where failure is not being poor, failure is not being able to consume more, all those ornate forms of life that end up influencing individuals in some way, telling individuals how they should be.The individual who does not achieve certain experiences, objects and stimuli will be a failure, someone who it will be labeled as a being of lesser importance than the others.

Things have not always been like that, but since the industrial revolution a campaign was launched to make the worker an unwanted being, all of which evolved to the idea of human dignity and the idea of work, since then the word worker would not be an word for the workers, but also for the individuals belonging to the industrial elite that would raise the infrastructure of North America, money became the central focus of the idea of work and duty.

But not everything remained there, since this idea evolved once again, towards an economy where production is not the most important thing, but the consumption of goods, which became the social value of the individual. It is not about having large amounts of money, but about owning each novelty, a world where everything is for sale, where the individual who has the most exclusive becomes part of a different level of status, so that he has no capacity to consume, he becomes a failure for society. Nobody wants to stay behind, we must try to reach the top at any time, since the race to success is driven by that deep fear of failure.

A manipulated stability concept

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Stability is also considered a failure, a failure called "Mediocrity". A society where the individual who does not want more than he already has is considered a failure, even though this individual finds stability and tranquility in that state, because the important thing is not how good it can be, but how dissatisfied you feel .

Unlike ancient Greece, where a mediocre individual was a person considered as balanced, a person who did not want much, and wanted little, this being the middle point. However, at the point where we are, the individual must strive to have the best, the big prize, and if not, will be a failure not only for society, but for himself.

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Failure and health

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The social and psychological affections caused by what people consider to be a failure are growing, one of them is depression, a psychological condition that, in order to be faced, demands the individual to question himself before taking any other action. What success does he pursue? His goal could be to have unrivaled wealth or become historically remembered, but that way you can know that he is not acting out of fear of being a failure, but because of what he has defined as success. Despite this, there is also the fear of success, where the possibilities arising from the conquest of what is sought are also frightening for the individual, who even knowing that he is capable, fear any consequence that comes with victory.

This could happen due to depression, low self-esteem, aversion to responsibility or other conditions, such as a distorted vision of reality.

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What to do about it?

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There are basic recommendations for the individual to face the world in his search for a goal.

Analyze your expectations: You must stop to analyze your expectations, to know if they are real, possible or impossible, in this way you will be able to avoid disappointments that have come from not having taken this point into account.

Gradual planning: Divide all great action into steps, turn them into very small steps, so you can enter them more easily.

What do you control and what not ?: Focus on adapting to everything that you do not control, and to adequately control what you do.

Acquire more knowledge: Education will make things easier, you have to consider all knowledge inside and outside educational institutions. The experience outside of school, and the knowledge imparted in it, is valuable and will be of assistance to you all the time.

Do not dismiss fear just because many speeches sell you the idea that everything is possible, not everything is possible, and you must bear in mind that everything entails risks, and if you are not willing to take those risks then the best thing is that you do not try or you will end up very sorry. Until next time!