Learn How To Accept Defeat, It Does Not Mean Failure

You may think that you do not need to learn anything about winning and losing. But if you do not learn to accept defeat and deal with success, you may have to deal with negative circumstances in your life.

It is almost mandatory to achieve success. Furthermore, success tends to be measured by strict parameters. For this reason, you will probably see success almost as a duty that you must perform so that you can later prove that you have actually achieved it. On the other hand, losing is considered a failure or even a shame. In fact, none of the concepts are handled properly.

In this particular context, it can be difficult to learn to accept defeat. Sometimes it weakens your enthusiasm and personal strength. Other times you can behave both obsessively and stubbornly, and you end up in a vicious circle of frustration.

Why is it so difficult to learn to accept defeat?

As we mentioned above, one of the reasons why it is so difficult to accept defeat is the false thought that surrounds it. The first is that if you do not achieve anything, you are a failure. The truth is, however, that there is a big difference between being beaten and being a failure. In fact, the former is a completely natural setback, and the latter just an attitude.

In general, if you can not accept defeat, you are probably struggling in three areas of your life:

• Low frustration tolerance. You find it difficult to settle down with the fact that things do not always turn out the way you want them to.

• Low self-esteem. Related to the way you judge yourself. You do not accept that you may fail or make mistakes. You have low self-esteem because you do not appreciate that you are exposed to being vulnerable.
• Value system. You tend to place excessive emphasis on success. This means that you pay less attention to other valuable aspects of your development and life. Therefore, you value the result much more than what you experienced to achieve it.

When you struggle to accept defeat, you may find that you experience a false sense of superiority. But when what you planned does not actually happen, the lies you told yourself will collapse around you.

Stop being stubborn and learn how to accept defeat

If you do not learn to accept defeat, you will end up being frustrated and uncomfortable. For example, you can refuse to accept that your relationship has ended. Thus, you try again and again to fix things with your partner.

Another example is not accepting that you have lost a certain opportunity. Thus, you may end up going on similar paths and trying to recapture the lost chance. In fact, you will probably be very hard on yourself. Furthermore, you will probably end up demanding a lot more of yourself than you are actually able to provide at this time. Alternatively, you can reprimand yourself for either stopping doing something or not doing it at all.

This stubbornness does not allow you to deal with what happened. You can also not learn from the experience. In addition, your negative emotions increase, and you become angry and frustrated. Furthermore, you can end up in a quagmire and even come to a complete standstill. However, this depends on how resilient you are to accept reality.

Learn to lose

From a psychological point of view, there is enormous value in defeat. First, it puts an end to the childish narcissism everyone is born with. You begin to realize that you cannot achieve everything. Furthermore, you do not get everything you want. In fact, all reality is built on this principle.

Second , defeat can be a great source of knowledge. From defeat, you can actually discover your own boundaries, where you have gone wrong, and where you are in your life right now. Thus, defeat generates new knowledge that you can use to reach new goals. This is how science works. It moves forward on the basis of error.

Knowing how to accept defeat means that you must learn to address it with both curiosity and interest. Yes, no one likes to lose. However, those who know how to lose tend to overcome the feelings of frustration quite quickly. Instead, they focus on what they learn from it. While it may seem paradoxical, knowing how to lose also means knowing how to win.