Finding Value from Your Failures

I’d like to introduce a guest blogger today. Bryan Greenwood is an executive leader at a client of Impacting Leaders. I was so impressed with his New Year message to his team that I wanted to share it with you this week.

As the New Year quickly approaches, it is common for many to self-evaluate and reflect on our accomplishments of the goals we have set for ourselves. During this time of reflection, we inevitably focus on our “successes” and “failures” in reaching these goals. Human nature is a harsh companion as it causes us to generally reflect more on our failures than our successes. (more…)

“Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterwards.”
– Vernon Sanders Law

I saw this quote on The John Maxwell Company’s Facebook page a few days ago, and man is it powerful!

Are you enduring a test right now – as a leader, an employee, a parent, or a partner? If so, here are some things to ask yourself:

• What am I supposed to learn from this test so I don’t have to endure this same test again?
• Am I handling myself in a way that I would be proud of myself (and others would be proud of me) once the test is over?
• What can I learn through this test that I can share with others who’ll go through the same test?
• How am I growing through this test?

Just like in school, these life tests are an evaluation to see if we have truly learned or mastered something that we’ve been taught. We learn every day through our interactions with people, circumstances, and conditions. The test is our walk that challenges our talk.