Failure brings you closer to reality
Not putting yourself out there to try new things allows you to create your own perception of the world. You can think how you want to think and you can say what you want to say and always believe that you are right. However, if you’re going to leave your comfort zone and stick your toe into the freezing water, be ready for one hell of a shock.
You see, whenever you leave your cozy, familiar, all knowing comfort zone and venture out into a new endeavor what you’re really doing is applying your theory of how you think the world works and to see if it sticks.
In my case, I thought that if I can explain the concept of TOO STRONG to a couple of hundred people, then the concept would catch and spread like wildfire. Honestly, if you’re going to wear a shirt, it might as well be a TOO STRONG shirt, right? Next, we went to the UFC Fan Expo in 2010 and thought that if we can get enough people from around the country to buy our shirts, then they would go home, show their like-minded friends and we would definitely catch on from there! Not only did we sell a ton of shirts but I’d bet that we sold double the amount of shirts than any other company including the very famous TapouT brand. However, in both instances I was DEAD wrong!
My first idea of telling a couple of hundred people got me a handful of sales and a bunch of people telling me that they would rock a t shirt if I gave it to them for free, duh! The next idea of spending over $10,000 to get to the UFC Fan Expo where we sold out of many of our shirts produced 3 sales in other states in the next two months.
You see, both ideas were my perception of reality. However, both failures have brought me closer to the “TRUE REALITY”. The true reality is that it doesn’t matter how great my product is. I’m going to have to fight with everything I’ve got in order to make this a reality. Since then, we’ve done commercials, a Facebook page, started using Twitter, started a Youtube channel and I’m writing these blogs. That’s just for starters!! There is so much more going down when it comes to getting sales.
Without trying what I thought was real, I would have continued to live in my false perception of the marketplace. By failing I’ve gotten smarter! By putting myself out there, my perception is closer to the true reality. This is exactly how you become wise!
Failures are truly life’s lessons. They are also excellent course corrections. Don’t be afraid to go out and learn the truth!
