Seth Godin Asks: What Matters Now? My Answer: Fail!
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Seth Godin has an early new year’s gift for us: a free e-book with mini-essays from 70 of the world’s biggest thinkers on “things to think about and do” in 2010.
My defining idea for 2010 is to fail! Fail early, then fail again, fail a hundred times, then fail some more. Fail as many times as possible, as soon as possible, in as many different ways as possible.
Because failing means that you are trying to do something you don’t really know how to do. Sometimes, failing even means that you are trying to do something that no one really knows how to do. That’s usually a good thing.
Because failing many times also means trying many times, not giving up, holding on, staying put. Failing many times is foolish, of course, but if you aren’t a little foolish you would never fall in love, start a business, fight for a cause, or write poetry.
Because failing in different ways means that you are learning from your old mistakes, and making new mistakes, more intelligent mistakes. By failing in different ways, you are teaching yourself, and perhaps others, how to succeed.
Because failing early means that you are extracting more than your fair share from every year. Fail often enough, early enough, and you will be older, and wiser, beyond your age. You’ll also have lines on your forehead, and perhaps white hair, to show for it, but that comes with the territory.
So, in 2010, my defining idea is to fail early, fail again, fail often, fail in different ways. If I fail enough next year, I’ll look back at it without any regrets, and what’s more, it will be the best year of my life yet again.
For context, here is an earlier ode to failure.
Update: December 18, 2009
Sandeep points out the problem with failure: you fail. The idea, of course, is not to fail: who wants that? The idea is to try 10 things instead of 2, so that even if you fail as often as not, you succeed much more often.
Jason Fried doesn’t understand the fascination with failure (follow-up).
Harvard Business School researchers found that Valley entrepreneurs with previously successful startups succeed in 34% of their news startups while entrepreneurs with previously unsuccessful startups succeed in only 23% of news startups. I can’t say I am surprised. The right study would look at all the Valley entrepreneurs that have ever secured venture funding and compare the success rates of those who had a big idea and stuck to it and those who tried out several small and big ideas, in the same startup or several. That study will give Jason something to think about.
