Learning from failure is overrated

It seems 37signals is running out of things to be contrarian about. It is easy to "invert" a saying like "learn from your failures" and make it seem profound but that doesn't make it any more valuable or useful. It is easy to learn from success as it generally carries momentum and begets even more success. Learning from failure is hard because it tends to cause people to give up altogether, requiring those who have experienced it to either stay optimistic and cull important lessons from it, or to simply go home defeated.

Be sure not to miss "Learning from mistakes" from 37signals. <a href="http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/60-learning-from-mistakes-friendster-etc" rel="nofollow">http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/60-learning-from-mistakes...</a>

Can we please stop posting every article from Signal vs. Noise here? If anything, that blog is overrated...here on HN.

Learning from Failure, Styudying your Successes... its two sides of the same coin as far as I'm concerned.<p>It's all about trying to improve your performance in whatever you do, arguing semantics is pointless.

Saying things are overrated is overrated.

"Dealing with failure is easy: Work hard to improve. Success is also easy to handle: You've solved the wrong problem. Work hard to improve." Alan Perlis, "Epigrams in Programming" (#101) <a href="http://www.cs.yale.edu/quotes.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.cs.yale.edu/quotes.html</a>

I'd say that learning from failure is the only way to really learn. Scratch anybody that's successful in business and all but a very lucky few of them will have 'failed' at some point or other.<p>You wouldn't be able to walk if you didn't 'learn from failure', it's our nature, pure &#38; simple.

You always learn from all types of experience. Of course you won't just learn how to do something by doing it wrong many times, but the reason for the "cultural fascination with failure" is that if you don't try you don't succeed, and if you do try but fail, should we say "well, you did it wrong?". No, learning from failure is an optimistic way to see failure, and it's perfectly fine. The post is a bit ridiculous.

Here is an amazing video which shows some of the famous people who failed. If you have never failed, you have never lived. Life = Risk.<p><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6hz_s2XIAU" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6hz_s2XIAU</a>

Learning from 37signals is overrated.

Right now I miss downvoting

The biggest deal about a culture that gratuitously accepts failure, is that people become less afraid to fail. Therefore, they are more willing to take risks.

The article wouldn't have its swarmy "contrarian" quality if they called it "learn from your successes ALSO". That's good advice. Indeed, the changes are your failures are things you're not so good at and your successes have been things your good at. Improving the things you're already good might just be a way of becoming <i></i>great<i></i>. Cool thought but we didn't need that "contrarian" bit.

learning from mistakes is part of it. experience is also crucial for developing confidence (surety, decisiveness, calmness ?)