I was a girl scout for a while when I was young. I was not that great at being a scout, but I loved getting those badges. I was so proud when I got one and always made my mom sew it on my sash immediately.
But beyond building campfires and completing first aid training, I think we should get badges for our failures. We seem to think of failure as something bad, something to avoid. Most of us were brought up that way. Our whole educational system is designed around passing and failing. This demonizing of failure can actually work against us. Success always involves failures of some kind.
Nobody thinks it’s odd to fall down the mountain when you’re learning how to ski, so why do we think we should know how to lose weight perfectly at the first attempt? Why wouldn’t we struggle and do things wrong?
If you are trying new things to lose weight, you will fail along the way. Some of the things you might try will not result in weight loss. You will attempt some goals that you do not quite reach, and you may not be able to do all the things that you plan to do.
It’s what you do after the failure that determines your success. What will you make that failure mean? Will you label it a failed attempt, or will you label yourself as a failure? Seeing yourself as a failure will often cause you to quit just to prove that true to your brain. Getting over it and trying again is the only process that works.
Maybe you are not even starting a weight loss plan because of fear of failure. Maybe your past dieting failures are getting in the way. But this isn’t relevant unless you plan on doing the exact same thing that you did before.
Edison had over 1,000 unsuccessful attempts to create the light bulb. Another way to look at it is that the light bulb was invented in 1000 steps. It won’t matter to you how many steps it took to achieve your permanent weight loss after you get there. It’s all part of the journey.
TRUTH:
Proverbs 24:16 for though the righteous fall seven times, they rise again, but the wicked stumble when calamity strikes.
