Why we never tell the truth about failure, even when we think we do.

Ok so the title perhaps sounds a little harsh...do I mean that we deliberately don't tell the truth when we are honest about our failings or our vulnerability? No. Do I mean that it is never the whole truth? Yes.

You may know what I mean when I talk about 'failure posts' or vulnerability posts as they are otherwise known. There have been a spate of them on Facebook recently that I have noticed (and yes...I too wrote one, you can read it here). These are honest accounts of how life really is and how hard it can be to achieve the success that you see in the 'wow look at me' postings of others. Or they are a way of sharing difficult experiences so that others might be able to take away comfort, greater understanding or a feeling of not being alone, when they read them.

The 'wow look at me' posts I'm talking about are the ones you see that say:

'How I made 30K in less than a month'

'How I lost a stone in a week'

'How my blog went from 20 views to 100K in a fortnight'. 

Given that this is not the reality for the majority of people (it is also the truth for some), it is hardly surprising that eventually people started feeling rubbish enough about themselves that they started shouting 'er, nope, that's not how it was for me' to make us all feel better again.

So now we have the backlash, the honesty/failure posts...the ones that reveal the fact that you haven't worn make-up for months and sitting in front of a computer composing 'Oh my God I'm so in love with my life' posts just means that you got fat and wobbly from not actually being out enjoying that life. Are these just as fake as their counterparts? What should we believe? After writing my own failure post, which was indeed the most honest I have ever been online (even my family didn't know some of those things) - I considered this question of whether it was truly honest, not because it felt fake or contained lies (it didn't ) but because I realised it was a reflection of how I was feeling at that point and had I written it on another day I might not have said things in the same way, or shared them at all - because that would have been honest too - on that day, with those different feelings and that different perspective on life.

So should we be honest and raw in our online presence or should we project an image that is appealing and aspirational to others? Is there a happy medium? Are we really being honest with our honesty posts or are we just offering a reflection of current feelings that could on another day be totally different?

Are we being honest in our honesty posts?

The short answer is no, and yes. There is an honesty there without doubt, things that are hard to admit, that we debate about sharing in case they are too raw for public consumption and may harm our reputation. We don't want to be pigeon holed by an admission of the truth when that truth becomes a past experience or state of mind that is no longer true. If you spill the beans on how things are not going so great but then they turn around and everything is going brilliantly will you forever be remembered for the time it wasn't so good and penalised for that?

The truth is only ever a snapshot in time, a reflection of the present moment. What is true for us at one time is not true at another. What is true for one person is not true for all, and therefore full truth does not really exist apart from in our minds or during a certain moment. The truth is relative and expanding and changing and individual. Honesty posts are honest in what they say but dishonest in what they leave out...whether you are leaving out the good or the bad it is still not entirely honest, just as 'wow look at me' posts are not entirely honest. We are sharing a personal perspective from a specific period of time, not telling the whole truth of who we are and it is important to remember that this holds for both the positive and negative projections that we share with others. Holding people to an image of who they were, or who they are right now, instead of who they can become is human nature to a certain extent, but it doesn't ever serve another to hold them in a space they are no longer in or no longer want to be in.

The movement towards more authentic interaction and sharing the bad along with the good leads to some interesting questions:

If we are all forced to be completely authentic and everyone learns that everyone else is just as neurotic and worried as we are and has days where they are ill or lonely or in despair...does that mean there is nothing left to aspire to?

Does life lose it's magic if we learn the truth?

Remember Christmas when you believed in Santa Claus? It seemed so magical, so exciting, so wonderful to think of this man coming down the chimney and delivering these amazing presents. What is life without belief in a little magic? Do we really want everyone to be constantly honest and remind us that the magic of Santa Claus is not real? Remember the disappointment when you found out that it was just our normal boring old parents delivering the presents?

Do we secretly have a deep need for our celebrities to be exciting creatures with wonderful lives, for the President to be amazingly powerful and dynamic, for the Royal Family to walk around in glorified splendour? Sure, sometimes it's nice to see someone famous being normal but if we are all just 'normal' at heart then where do we look for inspiration to be more than normal, to be spectacular? I think we need a bit of magic, we need a few vanity posts, we need beautiful film stars and Princes and powerful people to raise our expectations of what is possible, of finding something magical.

So is there any real magic left?

Of course...you know there is some intangible magical thread running through you when you feel emotion too difficult to put into words...when you feel your child's fingers close around yours and their head nestling into you for love and comfort. When you fall in love and find someone who fills you with desire and hope and joy. When you read a book that ignites a fire inside you to be greater than you are today. When you see sorrow in another's eyes and are moved to help them, to offer them your hand in solidarity, to notice them and validate them. When you hear a song that moves you to tears or laugh until your stomach muscles knot. There is so much magic in the world, it is not for the few, it is not for the successful alone, it is not just for men or just for women, it is not judgemental, it does not only come after you have meditated, read a certain book or made a certain amount of money – it is there, all the time. True magic.

So should we be honest or be aspiring?

I think we should be honest (read authentic...I think it is a much better description) – and being authentic is about the good and the bad combined, it is honesty in all parts of who we are, rather than a series of confessions of where we went wrong. Life is not all bad, or all good, it changes, sometimes minute to minute, that is the honest truth.

So aspire to be greater than you are, be honest in knowing that any part of truth spoken is only a snapshot of a greater truth. Share the human experience in all it's forms so that we can not only recognise ourselves and each other but that we can remember that the outcome to life is never that we rose or that we fell, but that we did both and we held hands across the waves with each other as we did so. 

Love Nova xxx 

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