🤷♂️ Moving on From Failure
One Must Imagine Sisyphus as Yourself
In Slick Talk from the Dicaprio 2 album, JID raps about the struggles he faces on a weekly basis and how he doesn't let it affect him.
Pissed off, I done took my fifth loss this week
Big dog, I can scratch that sh*t off like fleas
As a freelancer or creator, it is very normal to face failures that can make you question your career, skills, and future.
My most recent example was an article about Milfaya, a Moroccan Youtuber and Singer. It was a flop that made me learn a lot.
But before we can talk about failure, you should congratulate yourself for having the courage and willingness to create something and share it with the world.
That alone makes you better than 99% of consumers.
1- Does It Count as Failure?
With social media and its focus on success, it can be easy to write off your project/attempt/contribution as a failure.
Just because your Dropshipping store didn’t generate $200 in sales or your reel didn’t get over 1000 views, it does not mean it flopped.
They say that comparison is the thief of joy and I couldn’t agree more. Too many times will we compare our work to others and feel inadequate.
Instead, you should compare yourself to…yourself!
You might find that your current work is miles ahead of your last project. This includes both, quantifiable metrics such as views and sales, and unquantifiable metrics like technical skill and creativity.
Only when your current work fails to improve over the last one should you rule it as a failure.
For the Milfaya article, it was one of the worst performing articles in a while. It made it a critical failure.
2- What Can I Do to Improve This?
Before you throw in the towel and give up on your project, try to keep an open and critical eye on how to improve the project.
If it is a reel or video, consider changing the caption, thumbnail, or hashtags to boost engagement.
If sales are low, try to improve your copy or website aesthetics to better convert.
And the list goes on…
Too many times will we give up when we do not immediately succeed at something.
While Sunk Cost Fallacy is a thing that we should strive to avoid, giving your work some attention and maintenance can go a long way.
For the Milfaya article, I tried to change the hashtags as well as promote it more frequently. It did not help.
3- What Can I Learn?
When all else fails (pun intended), it is best to keep your head high and salvage what you can.
Like how JID scratches off the losses like fleas, you should equally ditch the negativity weight holding your potential down.
Take time to recover, analyze what went wrong, and compare it with previous work to rule out false alarms.
Once you know the why, you can learn from that mistake to further improve your skills.
If the problem lies within your skills, it might be time to improve them.
If the problem was the topic, then you know what your audience likes best.
If the product didn’t sell well, you should learn how to advertise.
For the Milfaya article, I learnt that the problem was caused by the topic so I feel like I understand my readers a bit more.
Finally, if you can’t figure out what went wrong. There is no shame in asking your audience about it or simply moving on! We’re not so perfect after all.
Even the strongest boulder pushers start from 0 once again.
What I’ve been up to
Last week I mentioned that my productivity has been tanking ever since coming back from the summer workshop.
Not gonna lie, sharing to the public that I’m unproductive made me feel like I’m being watched and held accountable.
So I’m happy to announce that It is mostly fixed.
Nonetheless, here’s what I’ve been up to:
Chasing down invoices
Optimizing SEO for a client
Organizing a rogue DnD campaign
Researching the next article
What have you been up to?