Chasing Failure

How Falling Short Sets You Up for Success

By: Ryan Leak

Narrated by: Ryan Leak

A USA TODAY Bestseller! Chasing Failure will help you remove every excuse for not pursuing the life you want to live, and that failure may just be the quickest way to success. Includes audiobook-exclusive behind-the-scenes content after each chapter!

We all have something we’d love to do, but often our fear of failure outweighs the potential of our destiny. But what if we found out that failure could actually help us succeed?

In Chasing Failure, Ryan Leak shares the science behind why people are afraid to fail, mixing in real-life stories and adding practical steps to help us intentionally chase failure in order to embrace the opportunities that come with it. Everyone fails in life—but if you’re willing to learn, improve, and grow because of your failures, you are already on the road to success.

As a motivational speaker, whether addressing people in corporations, churches, or youth events, Ryan has a message of hope: failure is right around the corner, so be brave enough to chase it! The good life is on the other side, and as he says, “God promises to be with you always, even through the failure.”

Packed with wisdom, specific strategies, and a key takeaway included at the end of each chapter, Chasing Failure will help you:

• Explore whether your dream idea is worth pursuing
• Count the cost and create an action plan for your idea
• Learn how to effectively deal with criticism
• Understand how to embrace failure and learn how it can propel you

By blending personal stories, get-up-and-go encouragement, and practical step-by-step advice, Ryan Leak will show you how chasing failure could be the quickest way to success.

Amazing

Bonus material was spot on. It helped round out the book and the ending brought tears and motivation.

Reframing failure!

Because of this book I look at failure differently now! It has always either paralyzed me from taking action, or caused me to stop moving forward if something went very poorly. I see the productivity now in taking steps, failing, seeing it as a success on the path of the long term goal, learning from it, and modifying the approach for next time. This gives me courage to try things that I previously was not willing to try.

Fail forward

This author is an ambitious, young executive coach, speaker, and content creator who tells his story about failing a tryout for an NBA team. The idea is simple- if you start out trying to fail, how far can you go? It’s a trick you play on yourself. You take the fear of failing out, by aiming for failure. Leak committed to failing by telling his hero, Kobe Bryant, that he was going to make a documentary about chasing failure. With that motivation, he started emailing NBA teams with a cold pitch about his idea. Several teams declined, but sooner than he was ready, the Phoenix Suns invited Leak for a tryout. He made a 15-minute documentary about failing that tryout. He didn’t make the team, but he made it farther chasing failure than he ever did chasing success. The other chapters of the book feel like micro lessons glued together. Here are some of the ideas that stuck with me: What’s your why? Keep secondary things secondary. For example, your company’s goal is not to be in the Fortune 500, your company’s goal should be to provide extreme value to the customer, and if it becomes a Fortune 500 company because it does a great job that is a secondary effect. Be sure to measure the cost of your dreams in terms of time, money, discipline, learning, and relationships. Don’t chase your dreams at the expense of everything you already value. The enemy of shame is empathy and empathy leads to compassion. Break your goals down into daily chunks- if you can make even a little bit of progress toward a goal, that’s a win. Just do it scared- if you wait until you have all the answers, it will be too late. Just chase your dreams scared. Stay ready- look for opportunities and jump on them. This was a short book with lots of little, practical tips.

Relatable experiences

I truly enjoyed this book and love the title because it's only through failure that we truly find success.

So good!

My favorite read for the start of 2024. I will read this at least once a year—so many nuggets.