Ours is a society that derides stragglers despite the fact that the parameters of success here are not all that sacrosanct. Failure perhaps is the unwillingness, rather than inability, to measure up to the warped notions of success, but such rebellion is hardly respected.
But here was an event 10 days ago, where “winners” had no place! Exclusively organised for those ticked off by success, the event on May 3 at Lamakaan was aptly called FailFest, and it relayed the success stories of those initially branded as failures.
Organised by Nabeel Adeni, who describes himself as a seeker, maximiser, social media evangelist and an entrepreneur among many others, the festival sought to change the way failure is perceived and laid emphasis on learning from failure instead of treating it as a tragedy.
“Failure, rejection and defeat are part and parcel of life. Every time the results are out, there are many suicides, and usually failure brings on depression. Our focus was on how to change the whole conversation around failure,” said Mr. Adeni.
The theme of FailFest this year was ‘Celebrating lessons from failure to inspire stories of success’. In line with the theme, eight speakers narrated their journey from failure to success. The youngest speaker was aged 18 and the oldest, 55.
Starting off with Pranay Rupani, who described himself as ‘Inter fail, degree fail, lecturer, head of the department’, the session had Bongu Bharat, Fatima Basha, Varun Todi, Vikram R. Mamidipudi, Mallikarjun Bhat, Anurag Singh and Rajshekhar Mamidana, all narrating their success stories.
Merely through publicity on Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/FailHyd), the venue brimmed with audience, Mr. Adeni confided.
More FailFests will be planned in future to spread the message of ‘learning from failures’, he said.
