The Tao and Truth of Failure (and how I failed)

How many failures have you had in your life? Me? I've had lots...lots and lots. 

• I was a failure as a prospective wife - we got engaged, had a child and then he had an affair with someone even younger than me - I was only 25 and he was already 18 years my senior. I am 37 now and never been married even though I had always very much wanted that to be a part of my life.

• I was a failure as a provider - my son's father didn't contribute a bean for six years after we split up and I was as broke as they come. I left with nothing and no job (I had helped my fiance build his business and worked in his Juice Bar for about a year before we split and therefore could not keep my job). I rented a house in a small village for my son and I that was so small he couldn't fit a full sized single bed in his room and I couldn't fit anything other than a bed in mine (not complaining though, we loved that house!). I paid the rent through housing benefit and my friend gave me £1000 to buy a car as my car went as well when the relationship ended (I couldn't afford the finance on it any longer). I retrained as a teacher on an unqualified teachers salary and we muddled by but overall I failed to be the mother and provider I wanted to be.

• I was a failure as a writer - I wrote a novel in my spare time, I put my heart and soul into it and although I sold about 2000 copies many of those were heavily discounted as a marketing 'ploy'. I now only sell maybe one a month and the profit is only about 50p per copy. 

• I was a failure as a business woman - I ran a magazine for parents of young children when my son was first born and we were living abroad, that I started from scratch. I taught myself design and layout, sold the advertising space, wrote the articles, interviewed people, ran events, did the photography...everything. I won an award for the business plan I wrote for it as well and got lots of publicity as a result and Barclays Bank even made me an official referrer for anyone who opened an account with them to get their marketing plan written. It failed to make money though, in fact it just racked up debts, I was rubbish at selling the advertising space and that was how it made money - I fundamentally just wanted something that would make other mums feel better and more connected, not to be selling advertising.

• I was a failure as a strong and powerful woman - I have such a passion for acting, I love it, it is in my bones and for a little while I wondered if I should actually give it a go. I had moderate success, I was cast in a couple of adverts, some short films, did some narration and even got nominated for a Best Actress award for a short that showed in the cinema. I also though met a devious small time Director who raped (I hate that word and it being associated with me, it's the first time I have ever used it) me and another girl and was investigated by the police and it all got rather horrible and I don't really ever talk about it. I failed to stop him, to report him (I only did so when I found out he had done it to another girl who was younger than me and I wanted to protect her). I failed to be strong. 

• I was a failure as a mother - I have one, beautiful and amazing son, I love him like my heart could burst. I also had another child though...a child created accidentally with a man who I didn't love and didn't want to be with and who was distinctly creepy (as it turned out...it didn't start that way obviously). I didn't want my existing child to always have to have this man in his life because we had a child together or to be around him at all - I chose my existing child over my unborn child and I had an abortion. I saw my unborn and unknown child on a scan before it happened, at nine weeks - they hadn't realised I was having an abortion and thought I would want to see. I cried, I said sorry, I said goodbye, I grieved and I punished myself endlessly. I still hold my stomach some days and talk to them to apologise again and again and again. I failed to look after my unborn child, I failed to care for them no matter what the circumstances...I failed as a mother.

• I was a failure at being a lifestyle coach - I wanted to be showing photos of how well I was doing, how I was enjoying a lavish and wonderful lifestyle, I wanted to lie and pretend that all was amazing and that I had never made so much money in my life. But it wasn't true..even though I contribute to several magazines, have a twice weekly radio show and have run some great events I still spend a lot of time working day in day out at a computer screen, designing stuff, marketing stuff, creating stuff and sometimes I'm in my PJ's till about 11am just doing stuff to keep the dream alive and to keep some resemblance of a proper business running ...I'm not looking glam and supping herbal tea as a take another selfie of how amazing I look (although believe me I still want to be that person some days). I also don't earn a lot of money still, some months I have earned nothing at all.

• At the end of the day I had to take a long look at who I was and what I wanted and what I was doing all this for because I came to the rather hopeless looking conclusion that I was a total and utter failure at being me - I have spent most of my life moulding myself to the right job, the right image, the right words, the right way of being, the projection that looked the best to others and I got tired...actually, I am tired, I am tired right now still of trying to hold true to an image that is not me. 

The me that I really am enjoys nothing more than a Friday night at my local pub with my son playing with his friends out in the large pub garden, having a few glasses of wine with the groups of friends that can be found there most weekends and relaxing and talking about utter crap.

I like to sing and dance like a loon - I like to kick my shoes off at a party and get onto the dancefloor and just chuck myself around a bit. I like to sing loudly and proudly with the force of Beyonce when I am alone and the windows are up in my car.

I like to have the time in the day to relax and chat with my son when he finishes school each day instead of him waiting until 7pm when I would come home weary from a day in London just in time to immediately cook him dinner and get him in the bath.

I like to create new possibilities and new ways of looking at things for myself and for others - I have a deep belief and unending belief that somewhere in among all my failures is a suggestion of where success lay for me and for others too, I feel it is a journey that has been a wonderful teacher and has given me so many gifts. This is what I bring to others - I can see the gift in them when they have lost all sight of where they are going.

So I decided that whatever happens next for me...whether I leave Coaching and get a 'proper' job or whether I continue along this path, the important thing is to be completely authentic from now on.

I read something this morning

'..that the opposite of a correct statement is a false

statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may

well be another profound truth'.

Niels Bohr

 So my profound truth is that in many ways I am a failure but it is also a profound truth that I have not failed too. A divine dichotomy if you will. Whilst I failed to be a mother to one child, I succeeded in protecting another, whilst I failed to be strong as a woman, I succeeded in moving through a painful event in a way that no one would ever have known anything had happened. Whilst I failed to make the magazine work, I succeeded at learning a huge amount that most people never learn to do for themselves.

In the face of every failure there is a success - the two co-exist and therefore neither really exists at all...there is no success or failure, only a life to live and love to give and a choice of how you face the world.

I am your Coach who is not perfect, who has failed and who has succeeded at the same time. I would like to Coach you, to hear you and not judge you and to help you realise the nuggets truth in your heart so that you can speak from that part of you and change your world and the world around you. 

Love Nova xxx