What Can We Learn from Loss?

How does it feel to lose? Last night’s Super Bowl Game was rough for Falcons fans. It’s easy to feel defeated when your loyalties are on the losing side of history.

After a big win, most of us know how to celebrate. We come together, we toast, we eat, we dance, we laugh, we unite. In loss, we don’t always know how to cope, especially when the losses are more personal, and there is more at stake.

What is the value in losing? 

• We are more apt to see our mistakes, to learn from them, and to improve as a result
• Anyone who has lost a championship game, a job, or a relationship has an understanding and most likely compassion for other people going through a similar experience. We also become more grateful and kinder winners
• If we take the opportunity, it allows us to rethink how we approach achievement. What if a lost relationship is actually a win towards being with the right person in the long run? Is there a way to create more win-win dynamics in our lives?

Are you a loser or have you just lost? 

Disappointment is a healthy part of loss. When things do not go as expected, planned, or hoped, it’s easy to despair, or worse, try to emotionally bypass and pretend like nothing happened, which always surfaces sooner or later.

What ultimately separates a “winner” from a “loser” is all attitude. Almost every notable person we admire from leaders to writers to actors failed, most likely multiple times. It was their courage and conviction that allowed them to ultimately succeed.

We Have a Choice

Nearly a year ago, I wrote a post called “We Have a Choice,” which reminds us: “It can feel easy to give up or zone out, or we can make a choice. A choice to see the good. A choice to do the good. A choice to be the good.”

Loss makes us human. It is not something to be feared or reviled. It’s part of life, and how we approach it determines our place in history.

What choice will you make?