How to Recover from Failure (and how to Prepare for it)

I had just spent a week away from home. I was 17 and a half years old and very excited. We had been working with a local church that wanted to open its doors to its community. So we ran events for families, I played the violin, I think there were puppets involved and we had really bonded as a team. But what excited me the most was the car journey home. I was driving back to Manchester with Ken, the leader of the week. He was a legend in my eyes. I had been told when he had one of his 'chats’ with you it made you into a man. He pulled no punches, he was honest about what he thought of you and what you needed to do to be better and those 'chats' I heard had changed people. As we pulled out of Ewell in Surrey onto the M25 about to embark on a four-hour journey home, I turned to Ken and said to him 'How did I do?' I waited for the mic to drop.

Without even looking at me he said, 'You are really arrogant and I was determined to not let you up on the stage on Sunday.'

That was it.

Then silence. I was completely winded. I felt like I had been literally punched in the stomach. The rest of the car journey is a blur but those words and the way he delivered them stuck with me. They took on a life of their own, a weight tied around my ankle. Words become wounds and those wounds can open up at the worst moment – often a high stakes moment, always around failure.

About four years ago I was coaching a Senior Executive and I could see she had great content, great ideas and we had worked on her voice but she was terrified of actually speaking. I wanted her to deal with the inner critic so in the moment I came up with 'Gremlins,' a creative way of dealing with the inner critic. They daily accuse us of things but try to hide in our mind, convincing us that these accusations are actually our thoughts that we came up with. At best we feel winded by them like Ken’s words winded me and they slow us down, at worst we believe them and they shut us down.

I said to this Senior Executive, 'I have a gremlin, his name is Ken, he is short, has a huge belly, wears brown trousers and has hair growing out of his ears and nose' (so the hair might be an exaggeration there but that is part of the game), and he says three things to me:
1 - You are arrogant
2 - You don’t belong
3 - Calm down.
If I listen to Ken I will be a rubbish coach for you. I will be questioning if I am coming across too strong, I will feel inadequate and like I have nothing to bring and I won’t be able to bring the energy that makes me really good at what I do. What is the name of your Gremlin?'

That conversation with Ken all those years ago in that car stuck with me, built layers of pain and dug itself deep and tried to hide. Until I named it. To my surprise my client then immediately named her gremlin. Since that day, from senior executives to charity workers to teenagers, across many many nationalities and cultures I have seen people time and time again name, describe and do battle with their gremlin.

So how do you do battle with the Gremlin? Well you can’t fight fire with fire – you have to pour water over it. You can’t allow it to argue with you. You have to speak the truth, either about who you are and what you bring or about what you want to bring. Here are the three statements of truth I came up with:
1 - I am confident
2 - I will own every space I walk into
3 - I am unashamed of the emotion I bring to my clients.

The truth is I am passionate, I do get excited. That can be misunderstood but I am not going to make myself small. I am going to be confident. I need to own every space I walk into or I can’t do my job and coach people, so I remind myself of that and that helps me be a warm, welcoming presence, online or offline. I have a lot of emotion. Anyone who knows me knows this. So I am not going to be ashamed of it. In fact I am going to embrace it. When I step into the room with these statements of truth I am a better coach for my clients.

Som what is the name of your Gremlin and how would you describe it? Here are some to help:

• Tarquin, 28, red trousers, brown loafers, secret socks. He lives by the river in Fulham, South West London, works on the stockmarket, ex-management consultant for McKinsey.
• Sarah, 31, vegan, activist, lives in Hackney Wick, East London, only wears second hand clothes, and long flowy skirts, never smiles and cancels you at the drop of a hat.
• Virpooga, 55, wart on her nose, curly black tight hair, hunched over. She sits with a cold cup of tea and whispers accusations to you. She is always miserable.

Recognise any of these people?

The truth is Ken isn’t real, but the inner critic is. These are voices we have allowed to live in our head that are unhelpful, unproductive and their sole mission is to block you. You can either hope for the best, hold your breath and get through, or deal with them. So now you have the statements of truth, why not keep them on your desk on a piece of card you can see and read regularly. Saying them out loud before a high-stakes meeting is incredibly powerful. And if you really want to embed this, then go out for a ten-minute walk with your thoughts in silence, everyday for two weeks. No tech, just you, the world and your mind. Your mind is where your power sits and where the gremlin hides. By allowing silence you are allowing those lies to bubble to the surface. Just observe them, don’t do anything with them. Imagine you are standing on the bank of a river and watch them go by. You don’t have to engage with them. Just acknowledge they are real. Then when they have passed you by, when you are back from your walk, take out those cards and read the statements of truth. You will have created space in that walk and now you can fill up that space in your brain with truth. It works. And it’s hard work. But the fight is worth it.

Once you have named, described the gremlin and written the accusations, why not send me over the statements of truth you wrote down. My job as coach is to make sure that you aren’t fire fighting with fire, but speaking truth about who you are and who you want to be. Ken has changed now and I have another Gremlin – his name is Tony. He is 6’4”, wears Asics trainers and has light blue jeans with no belt on. He lives in the north of England. The gremlin is always lurking – it’s just about knowing how to get it into the light. And once it is in the light you have the power to change. And that power to change will make all the difference. And when failure looms – fear of or actual failure – take out those cards, speak that truth and you will find confidence rising to not shrink back. None of us are perfect, but all of us can choose.

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