Question – How do I overcome the fear of failure which sometimes prevents me from taking initiative?
Gurudev – Just play with the kids, and be ready to lose the game with the kids. That is a very good exercise. Do you want to win all the time when you play with kids? You are playing a game with children, being older, do you always want to win? Your joy lies in making them win. So, you fail but you are still enjoying the game.
In the same way, some failures come in life, so what? Never mind because there is something deep within you that can never fail.
Look back and reflect on the many times you have failed. Don’t you now feel that those failures were good for you. I tell you, when you are on the spiritual path, when your heart is clean and when you are meditating, there is no way that you will fail, or go down. It will appear as though you are failing but that little failure is only to get you towards higher success. This is for sure.
When you look back at your failures, you will see that you have learnt something from them, and they have been stepping stones for you to move ahead.
In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna promised the world that ‘My devotee will never perish’.
A devotee is the one who has a pure heart. If you are cunning which is why you got failure, then you have to bear the cost. But if you are doing good things and failing, never bother about it. You are only going to go up.
There are only two situations: either you win or you make others win. You should be proud of making others win.
When elders play with children at home, they don’t always win, sometimes they make the children win and feel happy in their happiness. So making others win is a sign of a big mind.