A common phrase in our everyday parlance is “failing miserably.” People usually use that phrase to mean “failing very very badly,” but that doesn’t have to automatically equate to misery.
The person who comes in last in a race, but with both joy in their heart and a solid plan to learn and improve, did not “fail miserably.” The person who got the silver, missing gold by a fraction of a second, and is a mean-spirited spoilsport about it and blames the world for robbing them of a gold medal they surely “deserved” is the one who failed miserably.
Life has a natural, built-in catch-up mechanic: failures teach us more than successes. We just have to be willing to accept the lessons. That comes from joy, not misery – and it causes joy too, if we let it.
The Opportunity Machine 