Not All Losses Are Bad

Because losses teach lessons.

And sometimes, the lesson is far more valuable than the loss.

Early on in my business journey, over 15 years ago, I lost 5 figures on a shipment that I didn’t have the correct importation paperwork for. The shipment was destroyed and I lost about $15,000. But the lesson I learned about how to properly prepare & submit importation paperwork has been worth at least 100 times that already.

Almost 8 years ago I lost 6 figures on a retail store that I didn’t scope properly. The store tanked within the first few months and over the course of the 3 year lease I lost about $100,000. But the lesson I learned about how to properly research retail store locations has been worth at least 10 times that already.

During COVID I lost 7 figures because I didn’t pivot quickly enough and spent too much time trying to recover sunk costs. Through the lockdowns, retail store closures, importation delays, rapid exchange rate fluctuations and operational inefficiencies I lost about $1,500,000. But the lesson I learned about making difficult decisions quickly will be worth 10 times that over the next few years alone.

Losses are always hard to swallow.

Nobody enjoys losses.

But they are unavoidable.

They are a necessary component of competition.

They come with the territory of being in the arena.

And they are baked into the recipe for success.

So you need to stop thinking of them as bad.

You need to sit with them. 

You need to learn from them.

You need to extract the lessons and move forward.

And understand that the bigger your ambition, the bigger the lessons you will have to learn, and the bigger the losses that will come along with it.

If you know someone who would benefit from reading this, please forward it to them. It may change the trajectory of their life for the better, and the catalyst could be you.