Lose to Win
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Maybe some people succeed right away. Whatever I try, I fall on my face the first, or even the second time.
It’s always been like that when I:
- applied to university,
- met new partners and clients,
- closed my first big deal in an investment fund,
- went to my first European Jiu-Jitsu championship,
- navigated orientation week at business school, and so on.
Every time, the reason is the same — I live in illusions. This shows in carelessness, laziness, and naivety: “Maybe it’ll work out somehow.”
Reality then hits me hard. I feel shocked, hurt, ashamed, frustrated, and then angry.
Then something inside switches to “On.” Suddenly, focus, excitement, and aggression appear out of nowhere.
This burst of energy is often enough to get into university the next time, win the championship, or turn a profit on an investment.
Losing “inspires” me to do the work I tried to avoid. A mountain of delusions burns away in the flames of negative emotions.
In the end, failure makes me better, there’s no denying that.
Now, I scold myself less for losing the first fight. It’s just the cost of learning, the end result of which will be a win.
The ideal is to bring this cost to zero. For example:
- Extract all possible benefits from every failure.
- Notice patterns among individual episodes.
- Learn from the costly mistakes of others.
- Experiment more often in your mind.
- Make the cost of failure laughable compared to the upside.
Sincerely yours,
-Alexander
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