"Failure
in life is quite shocking, an insult, a humiliation..You should not fail in
life, it leads to embarrassment, lets you down..". This is what I used to believe decades ago
when I was a student. But over the years as I sailed through life, I learned
failure is not everything, there is even bigger purpose and life ahead. That gave
a sense of calmness and helped me take a more meaningful view of failure.
Recently
this interesting title "Why I Failed" caught my attention
when I happened to visit Sapna Book Stall, Bangalore. (By the way, they are celebrating
their 47th anniversary and offering very good discounts on many new books! Go
and make the best out it ! J ). When I flipped through the book briefly, I
felt it would make a great weekend read !
Believe me it did and stood up to my expectations.
Failing
is not a mistake. You need to pick up the pieces and move on. That’s what I
used I believed so far. This book further not only reinforced my beliefs, but
took my perspective to a different level. A level where failure can be by
design, can be a great experience in itself !
The
book "Why
I failed " is a great compilation stories from 16 Indian
leaders from different fields about the failures in their lives and career. The
author Shweta
Punj, business journalist working
with Business Today, has attempted to
take a refreshingly fresh look on failure in this book.
The
leaders have spoken their heart out and candidly narrated their stories. The
language throughout the book is very motivating and inspiring and makes a
breezy reading. You may finish the book in one go!
"Never confuse
your being with your doing. You don’t have to live the way the world expects
you to." Says
Anu Aga."Do what you love. It is better to be the king of hell than be a slave in the heaven" advises Madhur Bhandarkar.
Every
chapter is designed well with reasons for failures and key take aways from each
leader. What appealed to me was the sheer honesty and openness from these
leaders in sharing their failure stories. It definitely needs courage.
The
grit and determination with which these leaders carried themselves during such situation is remarkable. The message that
comes out very clearly is "Never give up when you are right. Believe in
yourself. When your purpose is clear, you don’t have to fear any one”.
Every
story is told very passionately and is quite engaging! I particularly liked the
stories of Madhur Bhandarkar, Sabyasachi Mukerji and Narayanan Vaghul. Especially
the last line in the Introduction "Happy
Failing Everyone! " has a very deep meaning.
I
would strongly recommend this non-fiction for
·
Those
who have suffered because of the way people looked at their failures.· Ones who is in search of a purpose in their lives.
· People who are willing to go experiment, take bold decisions, commit mistakes and make a difference to society and system
It
is very difficult for everyone to go and speak to such leaders personally on
their failures and how they managed it. So this book serves as one single
compilation which serves that purpose. Each chapter is life's one valuable
lesson!
Some
of the things that could have been better are - the cover page, but it seems
keeping it understated was by design. Overall, I feel the author has achieved her objective in terms of giving right perspective on failure. I would rate this book at 4 out of 5.
Happy
reading… I mean Happy failing very one ! J
