How to Fail: Everything I’ve Ever Learned From Things Going Wrong

How to Fail: Everything I’ve Ever Learned From Things Going Wrong
Elizabeth Day

From the award-winning author and journalist, How To Fail is a brilliantly funny, painfully honest and insightful celebration of the things that haven’t gone right. The biggest, most transformative moments of my life – those pivotal points where I learned important and necessary truths about myself – came through crisis or failure. They came when I least expected them, when I felt ill-equipped to deal with the fallout. And yet each time, I had survivedBased on Elizabeth Day’s hugely popular podcast, and including fascinating insights gleaned from her journalistic career of celebrity interviews, How to Fail is part memoir, part manifesto. It is a book for anyone who has ever failed. Which means it’s a book for everyone.Including chapters on success, dating, work, sport, relationships, families and friendship, it is based on the simple premise that understanding why we fail ultimately makes us stronger. It's a book about learning from our mistakes and about not being afraid.Uplifting and inspiring and rich in personal anecdote, How to Fail reveals that failure is not what defines us; rather it is how we respond to it that shapes us as individuals. Because learning how to fail is actually learning how to succeed better. And everyone needs a bit of that.

Copyright (#ua4202e22-cec5-553a-9267-7b5661460415)

4th Estate

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

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London SE1 9GF

www.4thEstate.co.uk (http://www.4thEstate.co.uk)

This eBook first published in Great Britain by 4th Estate in 2019

Copyright © Elizabeth Day 2019

Cover design by Anna Morrison

Elizabeth Day asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins

Source ISBN: 9780008327323

Ebook Edition © March 2019 ISBN: 9780008327347

Version: 2019-03-08

Dedication (#ua4202e22-cec5-553a-9267-7b5661460415)

For my godchildren: Imogen, Tabitha, Thomas, Walt, Billy, Uma, Eliza, Elsa and Joe.

Epigraph (#ua4202e22-cec5-553a-9267-7b5661460415)

‘Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavour’

Truman Capote

Contents

Cover (#u3ca7658a-9ac5-56c2-b89e-e49db88b3eb9)

Title Page (#uf67834bc-522d-5209-8a98-f9f700e1d62c)

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

Introduction

How to Fail at Fitting In

How to Fail at Tests

How to Fail at Your Twenties

How to Fail at Dating

How to Fail at Sport

How to Fail at Relationships

How to Fail at Being Gwyneth Paltrow

How to Fail at Work

How to Fail at Friendship

How to Fail at Babies

How to Fail at Families

How to Fail at Anger

How to Fail at Success

Afterword

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by Elizabeth Day

About the Publisher

Introduction (#ua4202e22-cec5-553a-9267-7b5661460415)

One of my earliest memories is of failure.

I am three years old, and my sister is ill. She has chicken pox and is lying in her bedroom upstairs, hot and crying, the duvet twisted around her small limbs, while my mother tries to soothe her by placing a hand on her forehead. My mother has cool palms that feel good against your skin when you’re sick.