Winsor Law Group Blog

By: Joe Urtuzuastegui

         I have recently been reflecting on things that have caused me fear or challenges, and while my challenges may not be extreme, my fear of failure has been something I have worked to master my entire life. Failure is inevitable, something that everybody goes through, and if somebody says they have never failed they are lying. Fear of failure is something you learn to overcome, or you let it engulf you, and the only way to address this fear is to take it head on. Vince Lombardi once said, “Winning is not a sometime thing; it’s an all the time thing. You don’t win once in a while; you don’t do things right once in a while; you do them right all of the time. Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.” Learning to win when faced with your fear of failure is a cornerstone to the prosperity you wish to have in your life. Anything that is done in life should be done with a purpose to succeed and at Winsor & Reed we understand that.

My fear of failure began before I was 10 years old and it has followed me ever since. During my teenage years I loved to play sports, primarily baseball, and I wanted to not only be good and have fun, but I wanted to be the best. I worked on my game every day, whether it was getting outside and doing physical work or preparing myself mentally for different situations that may arise. I did not want to fail at being the best, but during my Junior season in high school I did just that. I failed to make the varsity team at my high school and was relegated to the junior varsity team because I wasn’t good enough. This was a failure to me.

I had a couple options that I mulled over, first I thought about just quitting but that thought passed quickly as I have always been taught to fulfill my commitments. Next, I thought just ride this out and don’t worry about what they think, they don’t know what they are doing, but blaming others was not going to make me any better. Finally, I decided I will have to master this failure, I will do everything I can to prove them wrong, that they made a mistake. With this new mindset, the fuel I had was unmatched by anybody, I made sure of it. I developed a habit of being the first to arrive and get work in before anybody else, I focused my attention on every detail of my game and by the end of the season I was in the starting line-up for the playoffs on varsity. I began mastering failure at that moment and it carried me through my senior season where I was the MVP of the team and all-conference. During college, I again had to master failure, I was offered a walk-on position at the University of Arizona where they promptly told me I would not make the team, so I made the best of my opportunities for the next two years in the Junior College Ranks of Arizona where I earned a Scholarship at a Division I college in Louisiana. To me, that first big failure was my crossroad, I would either let it define who I was, or I would master the failure. Fast forward a few years and I was privileged enough to play three years of professional baseball in the independent baseball leagues. It is hard to know when and if failure will define the person, but what I have learned from my playing career up through receiving my law degree is that failure can be an asset when you learn how to master it.

One of the main purposes that Winsor & Reed strives to accomplish through Prosperity Law and Asset Protection is identify potential obstacles and risks to assist you in mitigating those risks before they are so catastrophic that they cause a failure to any of your life’s endeavors. At Winsor & Reed we can help make success a habit in your life because your family and your business should prosper, it’s the law!

*The information provided in this article is of a general nature and reflects only the opinion of the author at the time it was drafted. It is not intended as definitive legal advice, does not create an attorney-client relationship, and you should not act upon it without seeking independent legal counsel.