Writing about your previous failure can help you do better in future endevours as it reduces levels of the stress hormone cortisol, a new study indicates.
The research suggests that writing and thinking deeply about a previous failure enhances the body’s reaction to stress and enhances performance on a new endevour.
This technique might be helpful in improving performance in several areas, such as therapeutic settings, sports and education, say researchers.
In a future stressful situation, having previously written about a previous failure, triggers the body’s stress response to appear more similar to somebody who is not exposed to stress in any respect.
For the study, published in the journal Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, researchers analyzed the impact of writing about previous failures on future job performance in two groups of volunteers.
A test group wrote about their previous failures, as a control group composed about a subject not related to themselves.
These amounts were similar across the test and control groups at the onset of the study.
They also found that volunteers who wrote about a previous failure made more cautious choices on a new undertaking, and overall performed better than the control group.
Together, these findings suggest that thinking and writing seriously about a previous failure can prepare someone both physiologically and cognitively for new challenges.
