My children are a source of inspiration to me. I gain insight when I study them. Watching them is what gave me the wisdom to write this article about retracing steps. I was inspired by the efforts of my second daughter to move the walker. She was trying her best to move it forward, but I noticed she was only moving it backward; each attempt made by her only moved the walker backward.

This incident reminded me of when her sister was also learning to ride her toy bike. She could only move it backward for a while before she started moving it forward efficiently. This incident made me realize the importance of retracing steps.

We fail so many times in life, and we are afraid of trying out new things. As adults, we become angry, frustrated, depressed, and sometimes we feel like a failure. We begin to feel as if life has dealt us a hard blow. We blame the people around us, and we question our abilities and reasoning.

When I saw my daughter trying to put in more effort even though she wasn’t getting the desired result, I realized the importance of retracing one’s step. It is essential to learn how to take a fall. It is part of life, and it is one of the balls life throws at us. We all have had a painful and frustrating start at one point. Just like children learn to move by moving backward, we also have to learn this skill as an adult.

Allowing your failure to define your future is easy. Blaming other people for your loss is easy, and accusing the government and society is natural. Picking up the broken pieces and putting them together is challenging but more rewarding. The difference between a winner and a loser is in how they perceive opportunities.

Winners learn from their mistakes, retracing their steps and making a deliberate effort and adjustment to their errors. A Yoruba adage says, “when a child falls, he looks forward, but when an adult falls, he looks behind.”

Read this self discovery plan to understand yourself more.