Face your faults. Yes, you!
Have you ever noticed how quick we all are to accept credit for our wins and successes? And some of us even try and take credit that is actually due to other people. We love to look good, successful and dare I say it – perfect!
It is very natural and normal to desire others to look at us and marvel. It is a basic trait of being human. One of the reasons for this is the desire to feel special. Ideally, we should feel special without this kind of thing however that is an area beyond the scope of this article, though one worthy of a great deal of study.
I expect you will have also noticed that people are usually very quick to blame other people for a setback, and blaming others for their own faults is particularly popular amongst many people. Salesmen blame customers for lack of sales, company executives blame other executives, or even their employees, when things go wrong. Oh, and the holy Grail of the blame game is of course husbands and wives blaming each other for marital and family problems.
Obviously, we can indeed fail because of the actions of other people, however often the cause of failure is ourselves. Earlier in my life for example I was a big-time failure at all sorts of stuff. Many of the root causes of this went way back deep into my early childhood and were connected with extremely poor parenting – yes, a lot of it was the fault of my parents, and it wasn’t something I had “attracted” according to the law of attraction in the sense that I was too young to have done so. Fixing the mess however, was my responsibility, and as such the mess was indeed my fault. This was a key realisation during my journey to freedom and success.
It is so important to look at our own faults and fix them. You will not be up to doing this if you’re busy denying your faults to other people and of course yourself! You will be living in la la land. Unfortunately, many people live there.
Now, here’s some good news! I say that slightly tongue in cheek because what I’ve said so far is actually very good news as it is a part of the road map to personal freedom. Facing your faults will not only help you to succeed, but will help you win more friends and develop a much more pleasing personality. Have a think for a moment; I expect you remember how much you admired someone who admitted his or her faults and did something about them. You probably felt that you could trust that person more too, and were possibly more friendly towards them.
Actually, being self-critical is constructive. Blaming others is destructive and you don’t gain anything from “proving” that someone else is wrong. Constructive self-criticism will help you to build personal strength and efficiency which are both needed for success.
Do be careful however not to start looking for your faults on the basis of proving yourself that you are a loser.
Personally, I see mistakes and faults as stepping stones to victory. I welcome the knowledge of them with open arms because once I am aware of my faults or mistakes I can do something about them. If they were hidden from my view then they would continue to cause me problems. People who consistently deny their faults and mistakes end up altering their minds in a very unhealthy way – again, detailed study of this area is beyond the scope of this article.
My view is that anyone who informs me of my faults or mistakes is actually doing me a favour. And now you know why I feel this way. At times we can be criticised by people who are 95% wrong (in objective reality). The smart thing to do is to focus on the 5% that they are correct and work on that. If they are indeed 95% wrong for example, then they are likely to be rather messed up people and usually it is not worth your while arguing and debating over the 95% that they are wrong – just take the 5%, run with it, improve your life, and leave them to blunder around in their darkness. And remember, have a humble mindset – we can learn even from a derelict.
I am reminded of a quote by Elbert Hubbard, who said, “A failure is a man who has blundered but is not able to cash in on the experience”.
And don’t blame luck for your lack of success. Even if luck did have something to do with it, it would not have been everything to do with it, so fix what you can.
Top professional sports people for example put a lot of effort into examining and correcting their faults – why not be like them?
PS: If you have any ideas as to how I might improve on a personal basis, or business wise, do please let me know. I really do love to hear about my faults.
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Category: Personal Development
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