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Why You Need to Fail

Added Jun 25, 2018 •

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hi this is Derek sivers from Silvers. Org and this is why you need to fail I'm often invited to speak at conferences full of famous successful people they're all leaders of some sort people look up to lyric claimed in accomplished they have a great reputation they're struggling years of failure are behind them and that's the problem when you're green you grow when you're ripe you rot if you're not failing you're not learning so let's take a lesson from this and talk about 3 big reasons why you need to fail first if you're not failing you're not learning you know the way you build muscle in a gym if you do something a little out of your case Paradiso the tiny little muscle fibers actually tear then as they repair themselves they rebuild a little stronger and a little bigger to adopt that's why they say no pain no gain and it's the same with the brain these two sets of words for a few seconds the second set is intentionally missing a letter in each word so take 10 seconds to read both sides okay the test show that when quizzed afterwards people remembered three times as many words from the second column the one that was missing letters like when he saw the words with the blank spaces you struggled with it for just a second figured it out but that one second of struggle made all the different to learn something effectively you must make mistakes and pay attention to those mistake let's look at a similar test everyone was given a paper with some group a study the paper for four separate sessions could be studied only once but then was tested 3 times and showing their mistakes after each test a week later groups were tested brought back and tested again Group B scored 50% higher than group a that means that they had studied 1/4 as much but learned far more so making mistakes being in over your head I'm feeling this is proven to teach better than lots of advanced preparation this is not just for memorizing but for anything practicing music for example I went to Berklee College of Music and our music teacher taught us that if what were doing in the practice room sounds good then it's not practice now I get what he meant to some students would just play with a no start to finish if I was in the practice room sometimes I can't hear the student in the Next Room just playing everything how to finish perfectly in the practice room next to one of the best musicians in school and I was surprised to hear that everything coming out of his practice room just sounded like short phrases that making lots of mistakes each time like so lots of mistakes focusing on tiny little phrases doing what you know is fun but it doesn't improve you the most effective way to improve it anything is to find what you're not good at find the painful that difficult activities it will make you better than do those things over and over again until you've got it if you're interested in this there are two great books about it the Talent Code by Daniel Coyle and talented overrated by Geoff Colvin so Michael Jordan basketball legend you return I'm just warning 9000 shots in my career colossal most 300 games 26 times I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot amidst I filled over and over and over again in my life that is why I succeed okay so reason number 1 why you need to fail it's because if you're not failing you're not learning but it would be a shame for you to think these are just a little academic experiments like okay I'll remember that next time I need to memorize word pairs so instead try to extrapolate this to real life deliberate practice to improve skill is a fact it's a neurological reality knowing that how would you apply this to your life if you just keep doing what you're good at you're coasting you've plateaued you need to make a real effort to fail more put a voice inside you was probably saying that failure is not an option you're the top in your field you can't throw away a career of hard work you have a rep Haitian to protect you have an image to uphold you have an impeccable track record people would lose respect for you right well it's looking a very big deal fixed mindset vs. growth mindset people with a mindset think that Talent comes from an ingrained level of ability they think I'm good at this or I'm not good at this they say it is fixed that you either are or you aren't some people are born artists some people are born leaders people are just good with numbers and some aren't people with a growth mindset think it was hard work anyone can Master anything they think I got it because I worked hard at it they see the starting point is moot it doesn't better if someone took to a skillet little more naturally the young age absolutely anyone can catch up and surpass the so-called Naturals two two big reasons why this matters number one that fixed mindset hurts you there was a two-part test given to a bunch of students the first part was intentionally easy and the second part was impossibly hard so it created a situation of initial encouragement than certain failure after each person failed the test they were asked what they plan to do before the next test those with a growth mindset said they would study harder for the next test those with a fixed mindset said they would study for the next test after all this is something they're obviously just not good at so why waste their time the reason number two why this matters parents pay attention here is where this mindset comes from if a child is told well-meaning things like you're so smart you're a brilliant child you're so great at this you have always been a math whiz that it forms the fixed mindset view of the world but instead of praising the person appraised on their effort likes telling them you must have worked really hard or let's look at how to improve that then that forms a growth mindset view of the world what's fascinating is it that can be changed in an instant so we're what is 2 part test right so it starts very easy and gets impossibly hard now they did an experiment to see how a simple 6 word comment would affect their score if somebody were to take this test twice at 6 would ComEd given to them after first time so randomly half were praised for their effort they were told you must have worked really hard the other half was praised for their intelligence you must be smart at this that was it just a six word what's after the first test before the second those that were praised for their effort to improve their initial score by 30% when taking it the next time but those that were praised for their intelligence had their score decline by percent in the second test all because of six short words so to me this is a huge Point people that fixed mindset who think I'm in I am good at this I'm just good at this the collapse in the face of failure if you're interested please read Carol dweck's great book called mindset and Josh waitzkin book called the art of learning so why is this so important for my successful audiences it's because they're constantly being praised for being brilliant once somebody is successful everyone starts to tell them you're a genius filmmaker you're a natural artist even if you didn't used to believe that stuff it's hard not to when you're being praised everyday so no wonder they don't want to fail was threatened not just their self image but the fixed perception of their fans people like to think of their Heroes is Geniuses and infallible right so speaking of Let's watch Picasso paint documentary that was made by a friend of his that got to capture his process while he was painting it was in the studio with Picasso capturing the moment after every major change the photo so now watch the legs this is a bullfighter look at the legs on the bullfighter on the left side one leg down when I got now the top light just went up he's going to paint over that with a cape paint the cape red hide all the whole evidence that used to have it's going down on the right hand side look at his two hands the one hand on the sword is open and the hand facing forward is closed changes my band on the sword closes the hand forcing facing forward opens at watch the legs in dreams going to change his mind top leg is going to go down oh actually I love this the Bulls head that's nice looking at this number, so I can do better than that it's okay look at the legs are going down he's going to cover it up with a cape. I think that watching is processing and the mistakes is a lot more encouraging then just seeing a finished product this is why you should never compare your inside to someone else's outside we see all the mistakes in Hurst but we only see others final product but it's more of us would show the world our mistakes and are sweaty working process would actually be doing everyone a big favor soap the fixed mindset vs. growth mindset it's all the difference in the world third reason why you need to fail is for experiment this is the quantity here's what I mean in music school I took singing lessons I had a great teacher when I would bring in a song and okay sing it to me the way you wrote it so I would sing it start to finish TV shows. Now do it up an octave I can't sing that high he said I don't care go do it but by the end of three minutes of doing that I'll admit that I tried some things that I wouldn't have tried otherwise it gives you a new perspective on what you're doing then say okay now do it down an octave shoes to order of things the woods then it's a okay now do it double speed one two one two three four how do we have speed 1 2 3 4 and all of a sudden when you're singing a song half speed if the really focus on where you take your breasts me find all these kind of nuances of space between the words how you can use that so I need even help me do some other things like okay now sing it to me like Tom Waits would Now sing it like your Mick Jagger that's it stand up prance around the room like Mick Jagger do it right come on so you can run me through all these experiments when it was all done he say okay the head of the first original go again an element that after trying all these different ways it made me realize that the first thing I did was just yet another experiment was an awesome reminder that everything we do is just one option everything is next so the question for you is which one of these versions was a failure none obviously right it's a silly question there is no such thing as failure if everything is just an experiment so when story two types all together Ceramics teacher announced on opening day that he was dividing the class into two groups everyone on the left side only needed to make one pot all semester and that one pot would be great it's perfection everyone on the right side would be graded only by weight he said I don't care what you make on the final day I'm going to bring in my bathroom scale and we're just going to weigh it over 50 lb of pot gets you a name over 40 lb gets you Abby 30 lb of C etcetera I don't even care what it is I'm not even going to look at it just way it go so at the end of the semester there was a surprising result The Works of the highest quality what an outside Observer was watching at the end of the class we're all the ones that were made by the quantity group those that were being judged only on weight so it seems that while this quantity group was busy just turning out piles of work and learning from their mistakes the group had the one that was being just just on one punt headset there theorizing about perfection and in the end had nothing but grandiose theories and one Media Group pump so we don't have these perfectionist God sees so making mistakes and failing is a great way to break that paralysis and the end apparently it makes better work anyway so the three big reasons why you need to fail number one it's required for learning number to it keeps you in the what's mindset and number three it reminds you that everything is just an experiment musical terms instead of thinking classical music think jazz or there's this great saying if you're not failing you're not trying hard enough and lastly it's a lot more fun my name is Derek sivers I hope this was enjoyable thanks a lot bye bye

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