In Praise of Failure (eBook)

Not only is failure in sports, exercise, and even in the workplace inevitable in an imperfect world, it is actually essential to succeeding and performing at the highest level. What we label “failure” is, in fact, not failure at all. Instead, it is merely a component of learning, improving, and eventually reaching our optimal performance. Mark H. Anshel uses sports psychology in a grounded, easy-to-read manner in order to show individuals that failure is an integral component of achieving success in sport and in life. In this book, failure in sport and exercise settings is examined in a far more desirable and positive light than sports leaders, coaches, and athletes typically acknowledge, revealing how the highest-performing athletes have one characteristic in common—they learned and improved from failure.

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Many of our greatest athletes, scientists, and entertainers failed repeatedly throughout their careers, yet they refused to allow past mistakes stop them from striving for future success. Instead, they turned those so-called failures into opportunities to learn, improve, and eventually earn the achievements they are celebrated for today. Why, then, is failure considered negative in our society? Perhaps failure is not, in fact, something to be avoided, but something to be encouraged. In Praise of Failure: The Value of Overcoming Mistakes in Sports and in Life aims to change the way our society defines and perceives what is commonly called ';failure.' Mark H. Anshel provides a refreshing, new perspective on how we can embrace failure as part of the process of achieving and succeeding at the highest level. Anshel uses sports psychology in a grounded, easy-to-read manner to examine failure in sports settings, revealing that not only is failure inevitable in an imperfect world, it is essential. He addresses such issues as how to properly promote failure in sport and exercise settings, how errors lead to improvement, ways to constructively cope with failure, and how to help child athletes fail ';safely.' In the process, Anshel shows that the highest-performing athletes have one characteristic in commonthey learned and improved from apparent setbacks.In Praise of Failure shares stories of professional athletes, business professionals, scholars, and famous inventors who failed repeatedly before attaining their dreams, revealing the integral role failure plays in success. Offering a fresh and exciting take on how to approach the failures we face in life, this bookwill be invaluable for athletes, coaches, exercise and fitness trainers, dieticians, students, and even for the corporate world.