Earlier this year, in a blog titled “Here’s to the Crazy Ones”, I discussed our approach to failure and our attitude towards it. There is an insightful video from Simon Sinek, along the vein of thinking, about training your mind to perform under pressure, and I wanted to share it with you.

When I first started my career, I encountered a common issue: the organizations I worked for seemed content to keep me in the same position indefinitely. Seeking career growth, I approached my managers for guidance on building a career path but was met with blank stares. Unsatisfied with this stagnation, I began identifying “vacuums”—areas where there was a need but a lack of skills to fill that need.

There is something truly remarkable about the people and ideas that defy the norm. Time and again, we find that the greatest dreamers, innovators, and inspirations are those who don’t fit into conventional molds. In fact, many individuals who have achieved extraordinary things were often labeled as highly abnormal. This raises an important question: how normal do we really want to be?.

Five weeks ago, I sent out my first blog of the year with a statement that I was planning to hold a rhythm of adding a blog article every one to two weeks. This is the second blog of the year. I almost ran out of fingers on one hand by the time I figured out that I completely and utterly failed to meet this goal! So, why set goals at all? How do we handle failure? How do we avoid failure…or is that even the right question?