To hear a bit about the importance of openly sharing our failures and embracing that we all experience them, we reached out to Francesco Benedetti, President of Fail!, an organization that "brings together inspiring people to share their stories of, and lessons from, failure, setbacks, and vulnerabilities". Fail! includes a mix of personal and professional perspectives and delivers stories onstage in a TED-like talk format.

First we wanted to hear how this inspiring project came about. “Our team began this project as a response to the constant, underlying fear of failure we witnessed in the people around us at MIT, initially mostly students and academics, to realize that this literally applies to everyone,” Franceso told Bored Panda. 

“We feel that this fear is prohibitive to many who are capable of making unique contributions to their fields,” Francesco explained. “Through this event, we want to recognize failure as ubiquitous, and begin to think more creatively about the ways in which we can embrace it, and build resilience and psychological safety in hyper-competitive communities. By sharing these stories, if we can make failures, big and small, less intimidating and all-consuming, individuals with great potential will be more willing to take risks, think outside the box, and try things that may push new boundaries.”

When it comes to the goal of Fail!, Francesco told Bored Panda, “Our hope for this conference is to bring together inspiring people to see failure through different lenses and clearly state that we all go through setbacks at some point and, regardless, everyone can still become their role model (like the ones we bring on stage), because their experience was not always defined by success as well and they learned from it and grew forward.”

If you’d like to learn more about Fail! and hear some of the stories that have been shared at their events, you can check out Fail!’s website right here.  

Bad days are unfortunately something that we all have to live with. They can be caused by a multitude of reasons, including making a mistake that has rippling effects, losing something like our job or an important possession, being broken up with, having a fight with a loved one, getting injured or having a massively embarrassing moment. This list features the bad days that don’t have life-altering effects but that do make for a great story later down the line. From mildly annoying inconveniences to injuries that resulted in going to the hospital, on this list, you'll find some of the funniest examples of bad luck people have ever experienced.

These photos got me wondering though, if some of us are genuinely more lucky than others or if we all have the same amount of good days and bad days. Perception is a factor in whether we consider a day to be positive or negative, of course, but when it comes to things that are actually out of our control, are some of us just unlucky?

Richard Wiseman, a psychology professor at the University of Hartfordshire in the United Kingdom, studies the importance that luck plays in our lives. He began by looking at the difference between people who considered themselves lucky and those who identified as unlucky, and he found that the ‘lucky’ individuals were much more likely to be extroverted. They smiled twice as often and exercised more eye contact than the unlucky people as well. Wiseman believes that their sociability helps them end up in lucky situations because they meet more people, connect well with others and have an easier time maintaining relationships.

When it comes to the unlucky people, they were much more likely to be neurotic. Anxiety can help us focus on a task, but it can also allow us to put up blinders to other opportunities and miss what is going on around us. Unlucky people can be so busy worrying about one thing that they are oblivious to other opportunities passing by or miss details that could have helped them become ‘luckier’. Lucky people also tend to be more open minded and willing to put themselves out there when meeting new people and trying new experiences.  

Another interesting observation Wiseman made about lucky people is that they were simply more observant than unlucky individuals. He conducted one experiment where he gave participants a newspaper and asked them to count the number of photographs in it. Unlucky people took about 2 minutes to complete the exercise, but most of the lucky people only took seconds.

That is because on the second page, there was a message that read: “Stop counting. There are 43 photographs in this newspaper.” The unlucky people often did not catch the message and continued to count the images because they were too focused to notice anything else. With these 'unlucky blinders' on, who knows what else these people were missing out on in their everyday lives?

Unsurprisingly, Wiseman also determined that lucky people are more optimistic. They go through life with higher expectations and even when something goes wrong, they are more likely to look on the bright side. Unlucky people might not actually have very different experiences, but they are more likely to dwell on the negatives.

Positive people might not necessarily attract good luck, but if they believe they have good luck, they are not going to be phased by a bad day here and there. They can shrug it off, upload a funny photo online, and go about their day. Of course, there are always extreme circumstances where a bad day is completely out of our control or societal issues prevent certain people from even having a chance at ‘good luck’, but we can’t deny that keeping a positive attitude is always preferable.  

Wiseman is also an expert in helping people break their bad luck streaks and turn their luck around by enrolling in “luck school”. After one month of classes, 80% of Wiseman’s students reported feeling happier, more satisfied with their lives, and yes, luckier. The basic methods luck school students employed were keeping an open mind, being more observant, searching for the positive side in every situation, and going out of their way to break up their routines. So if you’re feeling unlucky the next time you have a bad day (a regular bad day, not a life-altering one!), don’t fall down into the dumps. If nothing else, you can remember that sharing a funny photo of your bad day online can help others smile, and that’s a bright side to your situation right there.

If you’re having a bad day, and you’re looking for something to turn that frown upside down, there are plenty of ways to go about it. Getting in touch with nature, for example, can be an excellent way to boost your spirits. Some fresh air and sunshine, a peaceful hike, some yoga in a park, swimming in a lake, or even just going for a walk through a park near your home can be easy ways to unwind. Leave your phone at home or turn it on airplane mode and allow yourself to put aside the stresses of your day, your job, or whatever is giving you bad energy. And if you need to listen to music to drown out focusing on the bad day at hand, I highly recommend blasting some of your favorite bops.   

It can also be helpful to release all of your bad day energy onto paper or to a friend or loved one. Maybe you need to call your best friend, rant about the day, and move on. Bottling up our emotions is never a good thing, and releasing them can feel like a huge weight off your chest. Journaling is also an excellent way to decompress. I find that when I feel dramatic and like my world is spiraling out of control, putting my thoughts and feelings onto paper is very grounding. I realize how far out of proportion I was blowing up a situation in my head, and I can take time to express gratitude for all of the things that are going well. My life is not a tragedy, regardless of how hard my brain tries to convince me of that sometimes, so I feel much better when I take time to acknowledge the facts of a situation. 

Sometimes a bad day can be remedied by treating yourself. Do something that you absolutely love, whether it’s watching your favorite guilty pleasure movie, cooking up your favorite comfort food meal, or grabbing ice cream from the shop that you always think about going into when you pass by. The little things can go a long way sometimes, so if buying yourself some flowers at the market or spending the evening painting your nails and taking a bath will put you in a better mood, I fully support it. We don’t all have the time to practice self-care every single day, but especially when we are more stressed than usual, we have to prioritize finding small ways to squeeze in moments of joy.   

Another great way to turn around a bad day is to find something that will make you laugh, or at least smile. Call up your funniest friend, watch your favorite comedy film, go see some stand-up, or scroll through your favorite funny articles on Bored Panda. It can be easy to go the whole day feeling stressed, angry or disappointed when you’re having a bad day, but not everything has to be colored by the failures of the day. Make sure you smile a little bit, and don’t be too hard on yourself. You deserve to enjoy some moments of every single day, even if you are in the hospital with two broken wrists from a roller-blading accident…