A Vague Feeling of Failure

This is what happens when a feeling sticks with you.

I am a failure. When I sat down to write this essay, those words repeated in my head. I am a failure. The reason I felt this way was because of my long absence from writing in this space. I’d written a few posts, and then I was done. I would try to come back, try to write some sort of follow up, but I couldn’t. It felt like there was something holding me back, something getting in the way of punching these keys and putting something out into the world. The first reason, if it wasn’t clear before, is my obvious fear of failure. But I was also holding myself back.

If you think about it, holding yourself back is one of the easiest things to do. Instead of doing something, just do nothing. More scholarly takes will use terms like self-sabotage or self-doubt, but I don’t think it’s always that serious. These terms imply action; they make it seem as though we know the consequences of what we’re doing, we understand them, and we’re going to go ahead with what we’ve chosen. But in the moment, it rarely feels that existential or life-altering. In fact, it’s similar to every other decision we make about our lives, becoming another thing we could or couldn’t have done.

It’s easy to feel like a failure, isn’t it? At the same time it can be such an extreme notion, very all-or-nothing. We either do exactly what we set out to accomplish, or we fail. There’s no room for error and nothing is open to interpretation. We keep score with ourselves, hoping to come out on top when the dust settles. We’re playing a game we can never win, a game that has rules we don’t understand. But you keep playing. This is what we’re taught, it’s what we know, and it’s the same mindset that we take with us out into the world.

So why do I feel like a failure right now? It’s simple. I set out to do something (start this project and write essays about things I love), and I didn’t do that. In my head, I failed at doing what I set out to do. In my head, it’s too late to try and start again. The amount of logic it’s going to take to convince myself I didn’t fail at this is monumental.

But here’s the thing: there’s a part of me (a smaller part, I’ll admit) that doesn’t think I failed. That doesn’t think I did anything wrong, in fact. This part of me is actually proud of myself for getting back on the horse, for trying again after a few months of not writing anything in this space. This the positive part of me that can be glass half-full, that can smile when it’s raining and understand that we all have our bad days.

Unfortunately, it’s hard for that positive side to be in control. It’s the negative side, the louder voice, who wants to control things, who wants to steer the ship. Negativity doesn’t always need to win out to have an impact. Sometimes, it’s mere existence can get in the way, making mountains out of molehills and creating problems where they previously didn’t exist.

When it exists as a fact, failure is helpful. We set out to do a specific thing and if we fall short, we learn from that and can try again if possible. People try things many, many times before they succeed, and it’s often the subject of inspirational messages and success stories we’d love to emulate. That type of failure is seen, examined and understood.

But feeling like a failure? That’s different. That’s like opening a can of worms that won’t stop coming out until you learn to put the lid back on. Talking with someone who feels like they failed, who falls short in ways only they define, can feel impossible. Even worse, sometimes this feeling of failure isn’t actually attached to anything. It’s just gesturing to something we attempted and saying “Look, I didn’t do the thing!” without defining what we hoped to accomplish. It’s a cycle that feels both endless and pointless at the same time.

I didn’t intend to write all about failure today - not completely, at least - but it’s amazing where the mind goes when it’s stuck on a feeling. Maybe I’m just looking for a way to justify something that no one’s paying attention to (something I do quite often, thanks to my anxiety). Maybe I’m trying to make myself feel better. I’d like to think this self-reflection could help someone struggling with a similar issue. Maybe I’m making excuses and hoping no one notices but me.

At the heart of it, it’s uniquely human to feel like we’re failing at arbitrary things. Every single day, we’re in a competition with ourselves to do our tasks, to get on with our day and do what we set out to do. It’s an invisible competition, and usually we’re the only ones who know what the stakes are. There are things we need to do, and then there are things we need to do. But somewhere along the way, all these things get jumbled. They don’t have the same level of importance, but not getting them done is assigned the same level of failure. And those feelings are what lingers, what stays with us and what we remember.

So I will continue on with this project. I will try to plan better, to think more intentionally about the things I want to write about and the ideas I want to pursue. I will share the things I love and what has me interested at the moment, and see what happens. I will try to be more specific in what I hope to accomplish, and acknowledge when I’ve fallen short of that.

But feeling like a failure? That’s going to need to be accompanied with facts and details. It’s going to be met with a healthier attitude and a stark reminder that we are all just trying our best out here, and I am no different. It’s amazing, the things your brain can do. And in keeping up with this work, I’m really hoping I can learn a few new things.