Do you fear failing or see each failure as an opportunity to adjust, learn and begin again with a better chance of success? Explain with examples.
I browsed through the community and somehow this seemed like a popular topic. It seemed like failure, which is often perceived as something negative, is actually not all bad after all. And I agree.
Do I fear failing? Yes, of course.
But do I see each failure as an opportunity to learn and improve? Definitely yes.
I am not sure if there's a difference between the Western and Asian culture/mindsets, coming from the Asian side, I think we tend to be more risk averse and more fear of failing. (Of course, it's not possible to generalise this across an entire group, but it's more of a general sensing.) I am not sure what's the reason behind this as well, is it because the stakes are higher? Oh well.
The issue is, if we were to just look at failure in silo, of course, it's not good and should be prevented. But if we were to look past this, and think about the trade offs that come with being overly conservative, failure isn't a bad thing too.
What do I mean by this?
For example, when it comes to managing one's finances, I see some of my friends just leave mountains of cash in their bank accounts or fixed/time deposits. They don't want to invest their monies because they "fear" losing money. Of course, no one likes to lose their hard earned money (i.e. viewing the failure in silo mode), but the trade off is they earn a significant much lower return on their monies versus putting in the market, be it a low cost index fund, or as some folks do (not saying I am advocating this lol), putting in BTC.
Well, is the trade off worth it? Maybe. To some, maybe they cannot handle market volatility well and a peace of mind is priceless. But to some, they value financial freedom/independence as a goal in their life and believe their risk taking approach will reap rewards in the long term.
I used to be more risk averse when I was younger, perhaps influenced by how I was raised. But as I grew older, I appreciated the process of experimentation and the joy and satisfaction of trial and error, from initially failing to getting it right after a few tries.
It's the same with my personal investment journey. I didn't have any investment background but it didn't stop me from experimenting with investing my money with the aim of generating a better return than bank interest. I attended seminars, read books, watched Youtube videos, etc and despite knowing all these stuff won't prepare me 100%, I still went ahead. I bought my first stock in 2013 and it has been 12 years since. There were a lot of ups and downs during these 12 years (most people probably would be familiar with the 2020 crash during the Covid period), and I had stocks that went to zero because the company folded, but with each event or "failure", I learnt to adjust my portfolio and be more comfortable with managing my emotions during periods of market volatility, and I think I am in a better place now.
Naturally, being close to the markets, I also bought my first ever crypto (which is BTC) in 2019. Most people didn't believe in cryptos back then, but for me, I still went in with a little bit of conviction despite knowing the possibility of failure is not insignificant. I don't intend to turn this post into a finance/crypto post, but so much have happened in this space over the past 6 years. It was definitely not smooth sailing, and there were so many unforeseen events, but I took them in a positive light and always tried to see how I could do better next time.
The experimentation mindset went on and in 2021, I came onto Hive via Splinterlands. I didn't know how this whole thing was, but with a curious mindset, it took me a while to figure things out and I am still learning new things every now and then. During the bear markets (or some would say crypto winter), some people wondered if games like Splinterlands or platforms like Hive will make it through, and a considerable amount of people I know have left for good. But a handful of us still remained. In a way, the drop in the price of Hive could be seen as a "failure", and there were fears what if Hive drops to almost zero (our assets would be worthless). Do I fear that? A little, yes. But with a little bravery, a little conviction, and another tinge of optimism, I stayed on and look where we are at now. Haha.
Ending off this post with the matcha latte that I had this weekend, may the markets continue to be green in 2025. Haha! Thanks for reading and hope you find the bravery, the conviction, and the optimism to step out of your comfort zone too!
