Every single one of us has a life blooper reel. And usually, with very little effort, we can play that loop over and over again in our heads. Sometimes it torments us. Other times, seemingly from out of nowhere, it can make us laugh out loud causing other people to think we’re nuts. That time we fell down the stairs in front of our boss. That time we tripped up the stairs in front of the team. That presentation where our mind went completely blank and we hid under the school bleachers (that literally happened to me in fourth grade). That joke that landed with a deafening thud (that’s happened to me numerous times). The feeling in each case is pretty much always the same: a hot flash of shame or a knot in the stomach.
And…this reaction is totally normal. Totally. It’s not novel either. Not wanting to be embarrassed or afraid is a pretty ancient instinct. The problem is: sometimes we choose to let our mess-ups define us. For instance, sometimes we don’t just see a failure as a single event but as a reflection of who we are as a person. So, we say things like, “I failed.” Then that statement can (slowly or quickly) morph into, “I am a failure.” This toxic internal script functions like a Karate Kid leg sweep on our psyche.
After we mess up, we can sometimes get so scared of the feeling of failing again that we avoid everything. That includes the very things that are meant to help us grow. As a comedian, that might look like avoiding shows, networking, writing jokes, going on podcasts, or any other host of things. But failure is a part of life. And it is part of who we are. Yet, it doesn’t have to define us; in fact, there’s a way of preventing it from defining us.
Once again, it involves (cognitive) reframing. In this case we reframe our failure into data/information. That might sound robotic or too computational, so let me say more. (Besides, this is where the science gets really cool.) Essentially, our brains have something akin to a built-in error-detection system. When things don’t go as planned, our brain sends up a mental flare. It’s how we interpret that flare that’s key. When we react with shame, we trigger our brain’s threat response team. But when we react with humor, we do something incredible: we activate the brain’s reward system.
Put differently: finding the humor in a failure creates psychological distance between us, that is, who we are, and the event/the failure itself. In doing so, it transforms the experience from a threat into something non-threatening; it makes the failure/threat rather benign. The strategy then, is to use humor to reframe setbacks. This allows us to shift our perspective from being frustrated over failures to viewing failures as opportunities. Besides, failure’s proof that we we’re actually trying and, even if it becomes part of the blooper real, trying definitely counts for something.
Viewing failure as a data point rather than a threat and being able to find the funny it helps us acknowledge our mistakes without letting them define us. It helps us see that our failures aren’t always liabilities; sometimes, in fact, they’re assets. In this perspective, each blunder is, again, a data point on a path to becoming a smarter and more resilient person, a person who will do better next time because now we know and, as the old saying goes, “Knowing’s half the battle.” With this experience under our belt, next time failure strikes, we’ll be more ready for it. And, hopefully, we’ll also be able more ready to laugh.