Going through a failure, rejection, or complete block of ideas can make it extremely challenging to create new content. It‘s always hard to gather enough motivation to do something when you aren’t even sure you’re good enough. Whenever I experience extreme creator’s block or am devastated that something didn’t work out, people tell me that failure was a stepping stone to my ultimate success, though this never changes how bad it feels. Failing sucks and only becomes the stepping stone you need if you know how to deal with it. Dealing with a failure in a nurturing and understanding way can change a failure into a falling-off.
When you’ve fallen off whatever you’re doing, you’re in the wake of what you want to do. This wave of leftover emotions can feel like a truck running you over. Taking care of yourself and meeting your basic needs can feel like the world’s greatest task and it can be tough to keep going and to not give up entirely. Here are some suggestions from my personal experience with falling off.
Whenever I feel insecure about what I am doing, I spend the day resetting. Resetting means clearing out the bad energy centered around whatever you’re doing. For instance, if my room is messy, I haven’t seen my friends for a while, or I haven’t eaten or gone to the gym, I make sure I try to do at least one of these things. I take the insecure days where I don’t feel like working on my creations to completely reset and meet my basic needs. Resetting my space is a great way to help clear out the stagnant or disappointing perspective on whatever I am doing. It allows me to detach my self-worth from my work and lets it go back to being my fun hobby.
The next thing I do after spending time resetting is reflecting on what went right and wrong by assessing if I actually failed or if my timing was off. Things like this help me to see mini successes hidden in the failure. After evaluating what went wrong and right, you should work on the stuff that motivates you to keep working.
The last thing I suggest is reminding yourself that bad days are okay. You don’t have to be entirely on your a-game all the time. Everyone has bad days; it’s just a part of the process. Here is where that “failure is the building block to achievement” saying comes in. Just remember that Steve Jobs got fired from Apple and Disney because he supposedly lacked creativity.
Build a habit out of failing, resetting, reflecting and accepting. I hope it helps you keep yourself on the path to achieving everything you want.