one of the best pieces of advice I have learned is that failure is essential for growth. you cannot truly learn something without trying it for the first time and chances are you will not be the best right away. that is the beauty of it, because the lessons are in the learning. through trial and error you discover, improve, and grow. fall in love with the process more than the end result, the outcome is just a short term feeling often outside your full control. The process is where your identity is built.
question
question everything, become curious. ask yourself if you can do such a task, you won't know until you try. don't let people around you dictate what you can or can't do. their opinions don't matter at the end of the day, as long as you do what is making you happy. don't care about what others think, especially the people who you think are lame. "what if the risk you've been avoiding, is the breakthrough you've been waiting for?"
learn
get passionate, nerd out, fanboy over something and fully embrace it. learn as much as you can and keep learning. find knowledge as a flex and share it with others so they can learn to. be that person who knows how to start a fire using sock lint, be the person who knows 5 different languages, learn every scale on the guitar! keep learning, all that info is what makes you, you and don't settle.
fail
failure is not the end of the world. it shouldn't stop you from doing and achieving something. failure should be a lesson that you must learn from. if you knew success was at the end, but you had to fail 100 times to get there, you would want to fail that 100 times as soon as possible right? so keep failing because it is what is needed to become successful. you think Tony hawk did the 900 on his first attempt? tbh I don't know but I doubt it, he didn't stop and said this was impossible, instead he pushed through and did it. so keep failing, because failure doesn't mean you lost.
try
when did trying become uncool? being known as a try hard sounds like a bad thing, but in reality why wouldn't you give 100% into something? if you give something 50% effort you will likely get a 50% outcome. you think these athletes made it too the big leagues giving 30%? no so why should you? look a fool trying something because down the line you will keep at it and eventually make it look easy. you don't want to live with regret wondering what if this? what if that? so go out there and ask that girl if she's single, go and make that first influencer post, go out and try.
succeed
what is succeeding? is that even something you can measure or more of a feeling that is fully up to you? succession is what you make of it. one persons failure can be another's win, you hold your own standards and you know what you are capable of. a guy who has been going to the gym for a year is mad he can only do 135lbs on bench, but the guy next to him can only dream about doing that.
repeat
do it again. and again. and again. this whole thing, the questioning, learning, failing, trying, succeeding. it's a cycle you choose to live in. once you hit a goal, don’t get comfortable, get curious again. chase the next level, the next version of yourself. momentum is built in repetition, identity is shaped in consistency. being great isn’t a one time event, it’s a loop. so repeat the work, repeat the lessons, repeat the effort. keep repeating until the life you want becomes the life you live.
-hueheffnerr