"Keep Moving Forward" - How NOT to Get Stuck in Failure
- By Lynn Lawson
- Published 09/22/2008
- Self Help
- Unrated
Lynn Lawson
Lynn Lawson publishes One Funky Mama, an online guide that encourages moms to live fuller lives. Sign up for the semi-weekly ezine at http://www.onefunkymama.com and you'll be happy you have that extra little push to make your life more fulfilled.
View all articles by Lynn Lawson
Remember children’s movies when we were growing up? We watched Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Snow White and sometimes fantasized about how we would be swept away by the man of our dreams. The messages that we saw were all too often not educational or in any way realistic. Fantasy was what it was all about But, that remained unrecognizable until we grew up – the Prince that we watched in movies never came.
So, I was surprised while watching a movie with my children recently. Something amazing happened. I realized that there was actually a message in it that my children absolutely needed to take hold of and never let go. The movie - Meet the Robinsons, the message – “Keep Moving Forward”!
In Meet the Robinsons, an orphaned boy is encouraged throughout the movie to keep striving for his goals, no matter how difficult things may seem and regardless of the number of times he fails. He wants to give up every time he has a setback, but is continuously told, “Keep Moving Forward”. And, he does. In the end, he has this miraculous life that he could never have dreamed of, all because he never gave up.
This message is important for our children to understand and, fortunately, it’s stressed throughout the movie. It’s presented in an incredible way and I commend Disney for making this movie. But, there is even more of a need for us women to listen to and live this message. We’ve talked about moving past the fear of failure and into action. When you feel the fear, push throu
gh it anyway. But, what happens when you push through that thing you’ve feared only to find failure on the other side.
In these cases, the most important thing to internalize is you can’t stop there. There’s a valuable lesson in failure. Each time we fail, especially when trying the same thing over and over, we learn a new lesson. From that lesson, we can take another step, leading us a little more in the right direction.
So, here’s a concrete plan if you find yourself facing failure. When you fail, lay down for a day or two (you can take that figuratively or literally). This down time gives you the opportunity to throw yourself a pity party, but also allows you to clear your head. Oftentimes, the best ideas and resolutions come when you put a project down.
You can curl up in a fetal position under the cover or agonize over it however you see fit. Then, after a couple days of that…get up and get yourself together. Analyze what went wrong and give yourself the time you need to come up with a better plan. But never give up because you never know how close you are to a major, life-changing success.
All successful people live this rule. On average, a successful person fails an incredible number of times before reaching their goal. But the value in the lesson is they don’t give up until they find success (whatever that means for them).
Go ahead- hurry up and fail! Failure moves you that much closer to success. And, as you’re picking yourself up from a failure, make this your mantra – “Keep Moving Forward”. Cornelius Robinson (or the folks at Disney) would be proud!
So, I was surprised while watching a movie with my children recently. Something amazing happened. I realized that there was actually a message in it that my children absolutely needed to take hold of and never let go. The movie - Meet the Robinsons, the message – “Keep Moving Forward”!
In Meet the Robinsons, an orphaned boy is encouraged throughout the movie to keep striving for his goals, no matter how difficult things may seem and regardless of the number of times he fails. He wants to give up every time he has a setback, but is continuously told, “Keep Moving Forward”. And, he does. In the end, he has this miraculous life that he could never have dreamed of, all because he never gave up.
This message is important for our children to understand and, fortunately, it’s stressed throughout the movie. It’s presented in an incredible way and I commend Disney for making this movie. But, there is even more of a need for us women to listen to and live this message. We’ve talked about moving past the fear of failure and into action. When you feel the fear, push throu
In these cases, the most important thing to internalize is you can’t stop there. There’s a valuable lesson in failure. Each time we fail, especially when trying the same thing over and over, we learn a new lesson. From that lesson, we can take another step, leading us a little more in the right direction.
So, here’s a concrete plan if you find yourself facing failure. When you fail, lay down for a day or two (you can take that figuratively or literally). This down time gives you the opportunity to throw yourself a pity party, but also allows you to clear your head. Oftentimes, the best ideas and resolutions come when you put a project down.
You can curl up in a fetal position under the cover or agonize over it however you see fit. Then, after a couple days of that…get up and get yourself together. Analyze what went wrong and give yourself the time you need to come up with a better plan. But never give up because you never know how close you are to a major, life-changing success.
All successful people live this rule. On average, a successful person fails an incredible number of times before reaching their goal. But the value in the lesson is they don’t give up until they find success (whatever that means for them).
Go ahead- hurry up and fail! Failure moves you that much closer to success. And, as you’re picking yourself up from a failure, make this your mantra – “Keep Moving Forward”. Cornelius Robinson (or the folks at Disney) would be proud!