DO YOU FEEL LIKE A FAILURE

At many times and moments in your life you feel like a complete and utter failure.

You have made mistakes, you have hurt people, you have regrets, and sometimes you have done things you can never ever imagine you were foolish and dumb enough to do and then the most important of all, the one thing that is bound to make everyone feel like a failure - you have been unable to  follow and accomplish your dreams.

Then of course you have the usual gripes, I have not become rich, I haven't really achieved anything great, I haven't really contributed to the betterment of society, I am not a celebrity, I am not an artist, dancer or painter, I am not a Nobel laureate and I haven't won an Oscar. 

All romanticised dreams of many star struck youth, dreamt on many a star filled night, keeping some alive with hope while leaving some restless and filled with doubts. 

And then life happens, all dreams forgotten in the hustle and bustle of everyday living. The stars fade and so do the dreams, maybe to appear rarely and momentarily when you want to lull yourself to sleep fantasising about what could have been, through the corrupted haze of your dull life, just like the stars make an appearance rarely and momentarily through the polluted haze of our skies. Failure makes you a cynic. You become comfortable wherever you are even if it means looking at yourself in the mirror everyday and staring into the dull eyes of a has been. 

But then you carry on with the drudgery telling yourself and convincing yourself that your life is good. But is it really? Now that is the question most of us never ask ourselves, thus never able to dream again, never able to hope again and never able to fulfill our long forgotten ambitions - satisfied as little frogs in the well.

But so many of us actually question themselves. One fine day they wake up and say to themselves our lives are good but things can be better. They can see through the haze clearly now. They know what their dreams were or are now and nothing is going to stop them from aiming for the stars the mist had hidden from plain view.

The artists pick up their palettes and brushes and fill their lives with colours again, the dancers put on their ghungroos filling their homes with music and dance again, the writers dust off their diaries and pick up their pens again filling their lives with words long forgotten, the entrepreneurs brush up on their business strategies and plans and brush away the fears and invest in themselves, the leaders of the past lead again not as prefects or school captains but as leaders of society and charities and organisations committed to making the world a better place, the actors and models put their skills to test, the scholars and inventors, jump into studies again, inventing and discovering; all reinventing themselves. 

It can be done. Life can have new meaning. I became an entrepreneur after 40, taking a chance on myself. Though there's a long way ahead, it is also true that there's so much to look forward to now and so much to achieve. Life has just begun.

For all those who question the meaning of life and existence, reinventing yourself should be the answer to most of your doubts. And never forget, people accomplish amazing things every single day, in spite of all their doubts, questions and weaknesses.

So, if you have big goals you long to achieve, you feel like you’re behind schedule and fear you might not have what it takes, all you need to do is not give up. Remember, no one who quits a goal achieves it.

“…if you really look closely, most overnight successes took a long time.” — Steve Jobs

Failure is normal and most successful people fail more because they try as long as it takes. 

"Try things. Learn things. Failure is the tuition you pay to become a master."

You are not a failure until you decide you are one.