For so long, failure has been pictured as something negative, something to be ashamed of and something to be kept a secret. But a Swedish psychologist, Samuel West, has decided to put our worst fears on the table. He is opening a museum - the Museum of Failure - in Helsingborg, Sweden, this June.
Instead of showing successes, as museums usually do, the Museum of Failure will display over 60 “failed” products from big-name companies such as Nokia, Apple and Coca-Cola. “I really hope you see that these mega-brands that everybody respects, they screw up too,” West told The New York Times. “I hope that makes you feel less nervous about learning something new.”
West’s opinion isn’t a new one. Albert Einstein once said, “A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.” And this idea has been embraced by lots of companies in the US. Silicon Valley, for example, is the home of some of the world’s most creative companies, yet its slogan turns out to be, quite surprisingly, “Fail fast, fail often.”
However, there are reasons for his. “The best companies are those that encourage failure, embrace out-of-the-box thinking, and allow employers to make mistakes and see what happens,” wrote Simon Casuto of Forbes.
But some people are doubtful of this so-called “culture of failure”. They are worried that if failure becomes a “symbol of honor”, as Wired magazine put it, it may even be seen as “uncool” when someone tries to reduce the risk of failure. This may push people to care too little and try too little.
“Sometimes people hid behind failure, when they could have prevented it,” wrote Anna Isaac of The Telegraph.
So it’s important that you set apart the two kinds of failure—the kind that makes you a loser and the kind that takes you forward. The key is whether you’ve learned something from your mistakes.
“Learning is the only process that turns failure into success.” West said The Guardian. “If you don’t learn from your failures, then you’ve really failed.”
【小题1】What does the underlined phrase “screw up” in the second paragraph mean?| A．Make a profit. | B．Make a mess. | C．Make a highlight. | D．Make a risk. |
| A．The more failure, the better. |
| B．Accept failure, and try new things. |
| C．The more you fail, the less success you achieve. |
| D．Failure is more important than success. |
| A．Failure’s value lies in learning from it. |
| B．If you fail, you are a loser. |
| C．It’s not necessary to try to reduce the risk of failure. |
| D．Failure is the key to put you forward. |
