Using Failure as Feedback When Mourning

"What we call failure is not the falling down, but the staying down." 
~ Mary Pickford

Are you experiencing seemingly insurmountable challenges in assuming a new role due to the death of your loved one? Have you made mistakes in developing new skills needed to fulfill that role? Do you feel you are a failure because you continue to have "bad days" and are not "being strong?" Nothing could be further from the truth. Grief has a tendency to disorganize and confuse. Yet it teaches through the mistakes we make.

More importantly, if you are a control freak (as some of us are) or a perfectionist you are bound to confront situations as part of the grief process where you make the wrong choice. Failing is an inevitable experience because without it we never learn or grow in our ability to cope with change. So where can we start to put failure in its proper context?

1. First and foremost recognize that early in our lives we are all overzealously taught by parents and authoritarians that failing is taboo. This is done directly by implying how bad it is not to be successful and nonverbally by the way we are looked at when we don't come up with the right answer. This means on an unconscious level we build and reinforce the belief that failure has no redeeming value. It is just plain bad. Such an unconscious belief is devastating as we get older because it diminishes self-esteem and hurts our ability to cope well.

2. We can dramatically alter that belief. How? By seeing failure as an integral ongoing part of life in many respects. Since we continually have to make changes throughout life, hundreds of new experiences will bring successes and failures right up to the end. The death of a loved one is one of those sad experiences that throw many new challenges at us, many of which we have had little or no preparation to manage. We are forced to learn through trial and error.

3. All of this boils down to working on our inner life to see failure as feedback, giving us direction on the next move to make. Mourning is certainly not the best time to have to be thrust into changing our inner life to see our mistakes as opportunities. Or, to try something different, perhaps to seek out the wisdom of others. But historically, that is exactly what millions of mourners have accomplished. They have not let their miscues take away their commitment to persist and endure. You can follow the same path. Misunderstandings and misinterpretations are an inherent part of life. No one sails along unaffected.

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