Failure can be extremely painful. Indeed, the "normal" psychological reaction to failure is to distract yourself and do something completely different right away.

失败可能非常痛苦。事实上，面对失败，一个人的正常心理反应是转移注意力，立刻去做些完全不同的事情。

But extremely-successful entrepreneurs typically defy this "normal" reaction. They go back and try again at things they fail at. That's because they often believe in something I call the "failure faith," a powerful conviction that every setback¹ offers vital lessons that could not be learned any other way. Survey research for my book Business Brilliant shows that these highly-accomplished entrepreneurs rely on failure to tell them what they're good at.

但是非常成功的企业家总是反对这种“正常”反应。他们会再试一次。这是因为他们相信被称作“失败信念”的理念。这种理念相信每次挫折都会提供一些重要经验，这些是没法通过其他方式学习到的。我的新书《聪明的生意》中一项调查表明这些富有成就的企业家往往通过失败找到他们擅长的领域。

So if failure is so important, how can you best embrace it? When you fail at something (a new product, a negotiation², or a recent hire), what's the best way to welcome it, and hear it out?

如果失败很重要，怎样才能更好地利用它？当你在某件事上失败时（一件新产品，一次谈判，或者是最近的求职），怎样才是迎接失败、吸取失败经验的最佳方式？

Here are five ways to cope with failure and turn it into one step along your journey to sizeable success:

有5个处理失败的办法，能把失败变成你在追求成功道路上的一个跳板。

1. Forgive yourself.

1.放过自己

It may sound sappy, but it won't do you any good to torture yourself over what you should have known. The most unproductive thought in life is: "If I knew then what I know now." That's a fantasy. Put it out of your mind. Once you forgive yourself, in the words of Harvard professor Ellen Langer, you "create the freedom to discover meaning" in what you failed at. Langer likes to point out that minoxidil was a failed hypertension medication with the miserable³ side effect of unwanted hair growth. Researchers forgave themselves long enough to "find meaning" in the failure by developing Rogaine from it.

这听起来可能很傻。但是用你本该知道的事来折磨自己不会有任何好处。生活中最没有用的想法是：“如果我那时就知道就好了。”这是不可能的。记住！一旦你放过了自己，用哈佛教授埃伦·兰格的话来说，你“能发现你失败之中的意义”。兰格指出，米诺地尔（毛发生长刺激药物总称）是在治疗高血压的药物造成不必要的毛发生长的副作用中发现的。研究人员通过发明落健（药品名）在这一失败中“找到了意义”。

2. Talk it over.

2.找人好好谈谈

Find a shoulder to cry on, but not just any shoulder. Tell your sorrows only to people who have the "failure faith." Most people don't want to talk about failure because they are ashamed of it, which is why you are unlikely to get helpful support and insights from people who aren't also successful entrepreneurs. That even includes close friends and family. The truth is that there are some things that only other entrepreneurs will understand. You might be better off talking over your setbacks and frustrations⁴ with any randomly⁵ chosen restaurant owner than your close friend who holds a corporate⁶ job.

找个人的肩膀哭泣，但不是任何人都可以让你倾诉。把你的悲伤告诉给那些有“失败信念”的人。很多人不想要谈论失败，因为他们以此为耻。这其中甚至包括朋友和家人。事实上有些东西只有其它企业家才能理解。因此，你不可能从不成功的企业家那里得到有用的支持和洞察力。你最好选择任何一个经营餐厅的人，而不是那些从事公司工作的亲密伙伴谈一谈你遇到的困难和挫折。

3. Be honest about what really went wrong.

3.承认错误

Once a deal or project falls apart, own up to what went wrong. Start all the way at the beginning. The acute failures that killed the project right at the end might have only been symptoms of chronic⁷ problems built into the project from the get-go. Maybe you were working with the wrong client, market, or developer. The real lesson might be about choosing customers and projects more carefully, not about details of the execution that went badly.

一旦一笔交易或是一个项目因为某个错误失败了，那就从头再开始吧。让项目在尾声失败的重大错误可能只是在项目一开始就存在。也许是因为你是选择了错误的顾客、错误的市场、错误的开发商。需要吸取的教训是要更谨慎地选择顾客和项目 ，而不是纠结实施过程中的细节。

4. Take responsibility.

4.承担责任

Don't rush to blame the client or the vendor⁸. Maybe you didn't communicate your expectations properly from the start. Maybe you avoided asking difficult questions because you wanted to close the deal. Maybe you neglected to ask the customers what they really needed. Whatever you do, don't blame your partners or your team members. It's tempting⁹ to tell yourself that they need to be different next time. But you can't control them. Assume they will remain the same, and that you're the one who must learn and change if you want the next project to work out better.

不要马上把责任推给顾客或是销售。也许你从一开始就没有把自己的预期目标恰当地传递给他们。也许你为了完成交易，避开了一些困难的问题。也许你忽视了询问顾客真正的需求。不管你怎么做，不要责怪你的伙伴或是你的队友。告诉自己他们下次需要改进是很容易的一件事。但是你无法控制他们。假设他们仍然维持原状，如果想要让下一个项目顺利进行的话，你才是那个必须学会改变的人。

5. Try, try, try again.

5.再试一次!

Get back at it right away. There are good reasons why your second attempt at anything is always stronger than your first. And as long as something's worth trying, isn't it worth trying more than once?

马上重新开始。你对任何事物的第二次尝试比第一次要强得多是有原因的。只要这是值得尝试的，它就值得你再试一回。

Remember, you're trying to succeed brilliantly at something most people can't do at all. You're taking roads paved with bumps, potholes¹⁰, and occasional sinkholes. But what's the alternative? If the work were any easier, there wouldn't be any profit in it. So go out on a limb, every day, and sometimes the branch will break under you. But face it. You keep going out on that limb because that's where all the fruit is.

记住，你想要在大部分人无法做到的事上成功。你选择了一条充满了颠簸、坎坷，有时是污水坑的一条道路。但是另一个选择是什么？如果一项工作非常简单，它不会产生任何收益。每天都去冒险。有时候会出现岔路，勇敢去面对它。因为有风险的地方就有收益，所以你选择冒险。