You’re Gonna Need to Face The Hard Stuff

This year is going to be our year.  

Seriously. 

I feel it. 

The year of fiery females. 

Which is way better than whatever the Chinese Calendar says—no offense to the Chinese or their calendar, but the year of the rat just doesn’t sound as badass. 

Amirght?

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It’s our year, your year, to finally swing open (or kick open if that’s your style) that door you’ve been hiding (I mean standing) behind. That door that excites and terrifies you all at the same time. 

Because behind that door could mean epic proportions of awesomeness, or enormous risks and possible failure. 

The thing is, Boss Lady, “nothing ventured, nothing gained.” 

You’re going to have to push through those fears. You’re going to have to be willing to fail spectacularly to achieve greatness you deserve. The greatness that is on the other side of that freaking door, waiting to make you a Titos and Soda (with a lime wedge) and offer you a chaise lounge to rest your hustling butt. 

There are six things you need to know to fail spectacularly, and this is the first of them (commit this to memory):

You’re going to need to face the hard stuff. 

Duh. But seriously.

You are gonna have to force yourself to experience everything—every emotion—anger, self-pity, annoyance, sadness, fear, you name it.

Yeah, I know. It won’t be pretty. 

It’ll be like sporting bedhead and smeared mascara while your nose is dripping green snot. But it must be done. 

Don’t shove your emotions away. Acknowledge them. Feel them. Move through them.  

What a gamechanger it’ll be to validate your emotions, eh? To spend time with them and understand them rather than burying them in a shallow grave in the backyard, then running like hell in the opposite direction only to realize they have the power of Halloween’s Michael to catch up with you in the blink of an eye even though you were running like a madwoman and had a head start. 

We don’t want to Jamie Lee Curtis our emotions cuz there is no hiding from them. I don’t care how many times you run screaming up the stairs to the top floor of the house, thinking there will be an escape route. I promise you; there won’t be. 

You have to face your bullshit, your demons, your emotions. Only then will you overcome those that ARE blocking you time-and-time-again from the thing you most want to achieve.  

I’m not trying to rain on our fiery female parade here. I’m just trying to keep it real about what we need to be willing to do to fail and, therefore—succeed. 

I know that idea seems counterintuitive, but it’s not. We have to start thinking of failure differently. 

Sara Blakely, founder of SPANX says:

“Failure is not the outcome—failure is (simply) not trying. Don’t be afraid to fail.” 

Failure is learning, nothing more or less. And learning is growth, and growth is success.

Failure = learning = growth = success 

Following me? (It’s the best damn math equation ever.)

So grab those snarling dogs by the ears and look them straight in their eyes and let them know who’s boss. 

Confront every aspect of yourself that you don’t want to see because you are committed to your greatness. You are committed to your growth. 

Be committed to being fucking fantastic and take over your world with your awesomeness instead of crouching behind the door in fear.

Follow me here, connect with me here or keep coming back to this blog to get more on each of these six lessons on failing spectacularly.

And, if you can’t wait for the next post, check it all out (along with the rest of my story) in my book “When I Die, Take My Panties.”