What's your biggest failure?

[dquan97]

I read somewhere that if one doesn't have a huge failure, then they haven't taken many risks in life. With that, what's your biggest failure? Mine would be that I didn't try hard enough in college in order to get a job with a bank or some internet startup back in 2000.

 

[Alone]

Not making it to Afghanistan.

 

[HAL9000]

I don't remember.... Sometimes ignorance is bliss.

 

[amdhunter]

Joining the discussions on ATOT for the first time so many years ago...

 

[Meghan54]

Got offered an appointment to West Point while in basic. Didn't take it. Only real regret I've ever had.

 

[Engineer]

Telling myself that the stock price would come back....it must come back up....

I have a "tax" reminder for the next 16 years (out of 20 total) of that blunder...

Damn, that's so fucking depressing.

 

[yh125d]

I "failed" at college. By that I mean I made a career change to one that didn't require college so I left after a semester

 

[highland145]

One of many, slack in college. Graduated to a shovel, digging ditches for my bro with a 10th grade education. Crow/eat, crow/eat.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Mine was not buying a couple of Docutech machines and opening a printing business in Orlando in the early 90s. I had done all the viability research, had nearly convinced my business partners at the time, and was already talking to IBM about the machine purchses but we hedged because it would have been a quarter million dollar investment/risk.

My younger brother now manages the print shop of the two guys who did have the balls to take the plunge. They eventually sold their business to Wayne Huizenga for @ $15 million (then bought it back 2 years later for $5 million). They make money hand over fist. Their biggest decision each day is where they're going golfing. I still kick myself for that one.

 

[gorcorps]

Mine was not buying a couple of Docutech machines and opening a printing business in Orlando in the early 90s. I had done all the viability research, had nearly convinced my business partners at the time, and was already talking to IBM about the machine purchses but we hedged because it would have been a quarter million dollar investment/risk.

My younger brother now manages the print shop of the two guys who did have the balls to take the plunge. They eventually sold their business to Wayne Huizenga for @ $15 million (then bought it back 2 years later for $5 million). They make money hand over fist. Their biggest decision each day is where they're going golfing. I still kick myself for that one.

Ouch :\

 

[Fritzo]

I "failed" at college. By that I mean I made a career change to one that didn't require college so I left after a semester

Same boat. I nearly made it so I would not be employable if I lost my job due to lack of a degree. Fortunately I diversified.

Also, I wish I would have been more direct with my parents about getting me an electric guitar when I was 14. I was stuck with an acoustic, therefore none of my friends would let me in their bands. I got a late start in expanding my musical ability and therefore was late to the scene.

Finally, I failed at asking for help growing up. I thought I could pay for school, work, and everything by myself. I hated asking my parents for anything. They were perfectly willing to help, but I have a personality flaw where I hate people helping me with anything. Caused a debt hole that I'm just now getting out of.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

I set out to create something that would promote peace and harmony throughout the world. I ended up with the Internet.

j/k

I have all sort of little failures, but nothing really stands out, so I'm going to go with "FAIL AT LIFE."

 

[datalink7]

I wasn't able to bring all my boys home from Iraq.

 

[CVSiN]

leaving the US Navy at 10 years and not staying the full 30 years..

I regret that every day of my life.
it truly was my calling and I was good at it and loved my job.

 

[CVSiN]

DP =/ remove

 

[Fritzo]

I wasn't able to bring all my boys home from Iraq.

You can't blame yourself for that.

 

[BurnItDwn]

I went to college and wasted 2 years there. Shouldn't have gone at all, it was a waste of time and money.

 

[SZLiao214]

Going to college needing only a few side jobs to cover things and not making anything out of it.

 

[Possessed Freak]

I failed to seek advice from somebody in the early days of 1999, had I done so my life would be drastically different. Although if I did it I wouldn't have known all the people I met in the past decade... hrmmm.

Eh, screw regrets.

 

[Farang]

I approached college as 'have the best time possible while still getting the piece of paper.' That's exactly what I did, and that's exactly all I got.

 

[mmntech]

I went to college and wasted 2 years there. Shouldn't have gone at all, it was a waste of time and money.

Aside from teaching me how to write eloquent essays, university was the biggest waste of four years. I have all this education, but at 25, I've got nothing to show for it. People I went to high school with have already bought their own homes.

 

[nanette1985]

My biggest failure was choosing the wrong spouse. When the crap hit the fan he couldn't take it. As I am unlikely to marry again and definitely not having more kids, I haven't learned anything useful from that.

My biggest failure that I learned a huge amount from was a business I started in my 20's. I'd already been successful at running my own businesses and selling them for a profit, so I had a good idea, some good people, and some investors. We had a great time for a while but it turned out that we wouldn't be able to manufacture our product at a price we could sell the things for, and it went belly up.

But I learned so much at that. How the biz funding game worked. How to look at investment money as a tool, not as money - and that those investors didn't really care that we lost everything, they expected most of their high-risk investments to go belly-up. I made a lot of good friends & contacts, learned a huge amount about my field, and found out what's important to me - what to focus on and what to let go of.

Mainly I gained credibility. Amazing what failure can do for your reputation sometimes.

 

[Engineer]

I wasn't able to bring all my boys home from Iraq.

Very sorry!

My "failure" doesn't seem so bad anymore....and I don't think that is "your failure" at all....

 

[SandEagle]

not finishing my PhD
not saving from an early age

 

[TecHNooB]

Don't know yet. Tend to be hard on myself for small things that others would think is insignificant. Different rock bottoms for different people Although, there were two girls from HS I would have like to gotten to know..