A survivors perspective

Those of us who have experienced a brain injury are always looking for some sort of advantage; some way we can get a jump start on the road to living a fulfilled life.

One thing that is not obvious to us which does have a great impact on our lives, is the way we deal with both success and failure. This is a great example of how we can use our way of thinking to help us. After a brain injury, failure seems to become a common theme, as we go about trying to reclaim our lives by trial and error. On top of that, we seem to derive meaning from every failure – sometimes greatly exaggerated meaning – about our abilities and future, and we sometimes live in a world where our failures run our lives. This has an effect on the quality of our lives and on our efforts to live a fulfilled life.

Success, on the other hand, doesn’t come  as often or as easily as it used to, and means something quite different to us than it did before our brain injury. Many times, a major success for us is simply performing a task that used to come easily and while we think it’s a big deal or great accomplishment, others don’t see it that way.

For me, it was very important, when living my life after brain injury, that I learned how to “get something positive” from failing. Similarly, I had to look beyond the euphoric feeling success gave me in order to see if there was anything I could take away that would benefit me beyond the success I experienced.

What probably helps me learn is the peculiar way that I react when I’m excited. Although I do get excited when I succeed at something, especially when it is something I am not sure I would be able to do, I tend to keep that excitement low key and to myself. I have always been this way, maybe more so since my brain injury, but I have managed to turn it into a tool I can use for my benefit.

One way to look at the way I am is that  I’ve always tried to keep my life on an even keel, so that the highs weren’t so high, and the lows weren’t so low. That’s my way of helping to manage the ups and downs of my life, and it applies to failure as well as success. This is especially important after brain injury when we attempt things and seem to fail so much, and can make every failure into something bigger than it should be. What I have been able to see is that success and failure are really the same; they are both just outcomes.

Of course, that is very simplified, and, it goes without saying that we would rather succeed than fail, but it’s a good starting point. I must acknowledge that success or failure are not to be taken lightly; failure can have far-reaching, ugly implications, while some successes can be life-changing. Those times aside, however, I look generally at success and failure as tools: when we try something we either succeed or we fail. By nature, success brings its own reward.

Failures, though, don’t bring rewards, and  would be a complete waste if we didn’t learn and grow from them. Both success and failure provide lessons that stay with us our entire lives, and I do my best to avoid judging them as good or bad. I don’t want to have my ego inflated by success, and similarly, I don’t want to be sunk in a “culture of failure” which can happen when we lament what society calls “failures”, and allow them to drag us down and set the tone for our lives.

Those of us who have experienced a brain  injury need to learn or re-learn a lot of things based on trial and error, and we are going to fail at some things. That’s the way these things work. By having a healthy relationship with failure, and looking at failure in a productive way, we don’t have to get caught up in a “culture of failure”. Being caught in a “culture of failure” makes it that much harder to have any successes and live a fulfilled life. This is work, thinking positively about our lives, and it’s not easy work.

However, the power of our mind is strong,  and by looking at failure constructively, it’s possible to live in a “positive zone”, where we are not always down on ourselves for what we see as a failure, but we are more accepting of ourselves and our circumstances; experiencing life and learning about it as we succeed and fail.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jeff Sebell is the author of “Learning  to Live with Yourself after Brain Injury.” Read more about Jeff and his journey on his blog at www.TBISurvivor.com

Article Via Synapse Bridge Magazine Volume 19