Photo by Georgia de Lotz

What if you were a complete failure at everything on purpose…without knowing it?

Now, who would purposely want to fail at “anything, let alone everything?”

Sounds like an oxymoron. It’s like pointing a finger at someone who just did something we think is “a fail,” and we say, “What a moron!” as we look in the mirror.

Failing on purpose could be defined as the recognition that your intention may be to embrace success, but your actions say bring on the noose.

There are a few dead giveaways (no pun intended) as to failing on purpose.

The first is you tend to over-complicate everything—a trip to the bathroom could start a dissertation on which way the toilet paper hangs (I personally, don’t care).

Over-complicating tends to give you busy work, drama, side stories, challenges better left for puberty and so on. This, in turn, keeps you tied up with excuses on never reaching your goal. You can play the “woe is me” card (victim), I “do it all” (martyr), I am so busy paying attention to what everyone else is doing that I don’t participate in my own life (invisible and unworthy) and again the list goes on.

There’s also the group that needs to make sharpening a pencil a challenge because they are bored without a challenge.

There are ones who procrastinate because they’re bored, or require drama to feel important and needed, or love testing themselves at the last minute to become the superhero; meanwhile giving themselves unnecessary anxiety and stress.

Procrastination is also a sign of unworthiness and failure simmers below the surface.

Let’s see what else…

Not letting go of bad relationships is like saying to the universe, “I like this! Failing before I get out of bed. More please.”

Not leaving a marriage, which has been deader than Kilimanjaro for years and has no hope of resuscitation is along the same party line, no matter what you are blaming it on or giving up your power to…there is no reward.

Giving up your power, no one can ever repay you.

Ever.

It is failing on purpose.

How can you be successful in a situation that victimizes you? Retaliate? No, then you just take a different position on the drama triangle.

You have control. You can stop purposely sabotaging yourself.

No one else creates all these scenarios, just you.

Trying to fix your childhood by sacrificing your adulthood? That is a bumper sticker for failure.

I’ve someone close to me who chooses women who remind him of his stepmother. She’s what fairy tale evil step-moms are designed after. He wants to win with these women. He wants to be successful where he never was with his stepmother. He hasn’t figured out that you can’t perform surgery on the past.

When we are stuck in the child/authority figure struggle as an adult, we still can’t see the adult perspective. Sometimes, and I’m saying sometimes, we don’t see the individual instruments in the orchestra. Meaning: we don’t clearly get why we do what we do.

We can’t see our motivation clearly. We may have the intention to have a healthy relationship, happy career, supportive friendships, but our motivation may work toward re-living old patterns, so we never get what or where we want to go. And yes, we have that much control.

As long as I think I am not enough in any capacity, guess what?

I’m not enough.

If I think I am part unicorn and mongoose, guess what? I act the role. If I think no one likes me at parties and I try to blend into the wallpaper, I’m the one making me invisible.

These are all choices, some conscious, others are not. We have to develop enough awareness to see if our intentions and motivation match.

If I say I want to get married and it’s my main intention, yet I date guys who are unavailable emotionally or physically, what is my motivation?

Look beneath the intention to uncover the sabotaging motivation that is screwing up your goals. When you get clear as to “where” the failure button originated in you, it gives you a leg up on that wild pony.

Once you realize that any sort of failure you’re purposely creating has its roots in the past, it gives you freedom to create a new present.

You now have clarity or awareness of why you are motivated to suffer, when all your deepest desires scream for happiness.

Deciding to match action to intention is a major smelling salt to the universe; time to P-A-R-T-Y! When you start matching that desire with action, the universe is your partner. Miracles happen.

Making different choices for action can feel like you are going against your very nature. In a sense, that is exactly what is happening. You are creating the life you want and cutting loose that albatross of comforting failure from around your neck.

It’s time to boogie!

I personally have found that my intention matching action has dramatically changed my life.

I had to get to a point of rock bottom first, then slowly I built confidence that the present doesn’t have to a be a rerun of Groundhog Day. New action with a positive frame of mind is truly, truly, truly the greatest energy ignitor ever—you get into a rhythm of participating because you believe you deserve success not failure (and yes, we learn from our failures, but that ain’t the same as trying to fail). And just like Cinderella, the universe is your fairy godmother! (Okay, I may be slightly exaggerating.)

So, get clear, watch what you do, say and think. Does it match what you want? If not, take a breather, see why it doesn’t jive and then do something, which gives you a four of kind. It’s a match anyway you look at it!

~

Editor: Brianna Bemel

 

Like elephant Health & Wellness on Facebook.