When I sat down to write this article, I was planning to tell you the tale of the ten-foot shark that I caught in the Everglades during a raging thunderstorm. I was going to regale you with details of the fight that would rival The Old Man and the Sea. I would relate how my friend, who was with me on the deserted island where we were camping, poured cold water on my overheated reel to prevent the gears from burning up. I planned to share how our boat, which was anchored in the bay behind us, had been set adrift by the high winds and retrieved by my friend who waded into the shark infested waters while lightning crashed all around us. I would finish the story with lessons about persistence and the importance of teamwork when we are accomplishing big tasks.

But, while I was envisioning this article, I kept thinking about the fish that got away—the one that haunted me for a very long time. The lessons I learned from that experience are far greater than my Chief Brody Jaws moment. Hopefully, by telling my story of failure, I can offer you some nuggets of wisdom and maybe I can finally release the fish that was never caught.

It was a sunny day at Shackleford Banks. We had camped the night before and headed out of Beaufort Inlet for a morning of trolling for Spanish mackerel. We put out a spread with planer rigs and assorted spoons and a cedar plug. After bringing in several keepers, one of the rods bent over and started peeling line. I grabbed the reel and thought we must have snagged the bottom. I yelled to my friend to put the boat in neutral to see if we could back up to where the lure was snagged. After he took the boat out of gear, I immediately felt it—thump, thump, thump. Something big was on the other end.

Because we were out to get fish in the two-to-five-pound class, we were using moderately light tackle. The rod and reel I had in my hands was no match for the beast on the line. Every time that I made a little headway, the behemoth would swim off and take more line. I wasn’t even certain that he knew he was hooked. We decided that the best thing we could do was chase him down with the boat. After about 30 minutes of this game of pursuit, the fish surfaced.

I had climbed on top of the boat’s T-top to fight the fish and had a good view when the fish came up. It was even bigger than I thought. It was a cobia that looked like it was almost 5 feet long. It was what is known as a citation fish, which would have entitled me to a certificate signed by the governor recognizing my catch as extraordinary. In a moment of hysteria, I imagined how this fish would be the first step toward my lifetime dream of hosting my own television fishing show. Surely, there would be news crews back at the dock to interview me on my triumphant return. They would cut into regular programming with breaking news of the mammoth cobia. After all, isn’t everything breaking news these days?

My wild imaginings were cut short in the blink of an eye—or rather I should say a shake of the head. As the sea monster’s head appeared above the water, he gazed up at me with what appeared to be a look of superiority. And then, almost like he was playing a game of catch with me, he threw the cedar plug from his mouth back toward the boat and returned to rule his undersea kingdom. I was crushed. 

For those of you who do not share my fishing obsession, you may not understand the depth of the despair I felt when I lost this fish. But everyone has something that they care about deeply that has not turned out the way they wanted. Maybe you had the case of a lifetime and lost at trial. Or maybe you desperately wanted a certain job and were rejected. You might have trained for some sort of athletic competition and failed to meet your goal. The sting of disappointment can feel overwhelming. Did I do enough? Am I good enough? Should I have set the hook harder? Our apparent failure and disappointment can lead to feelings of self-doubt, frustration, and despair. But what if we looked at these situations through a different lens? These experiences hold valuable lessons that can positively affect our happiness and satisfaction. Here are five lessons about failure, loss, and disappointment.

1. Lesson #1: Let that fish go! Things do not always turn out exactly the way that we want. It is natural to feel disappointment in these situations. We might even need to go through a grieving process, depending on the seriousness of the loss, disappointment, or failure. But we must be careful not to get stuck in that place. Let yourself feel the disappointment or loss and then move on. Often, we get attached to our belief that something should have been different. I should have caught that fish. I should have won that trial. The DMV should be more efficient. My marriage should not have failed. That way of thinking creates unnecessary suffering. We cannot change the past and we can almost never control how other people behave. The only thing that we can control is our thoughts about the circumstances and events in our lives. 

• Lesson #2: Not getting what we want can provide inspiration and motivation to keep showing up. I did not give up fishing as a hobby after that day at Shackleford. It only inspired me more to get back out there and chase the dream of catching the fish of a lifetime. In the movie Big Fish, Edward Bloom chases an uncatchable catfish his entire life. The fish represents the elusive, larger-than-life dreams that he pursues throughout his rich and colorful life. Our dreams and aspirations are about those things that we have not attained. They are the hope of things to come. They inspire us to keep reaching.

• Lesson #3: Failure makes us more resilient. Resilience is that idea of bending without breaking. When we have setbacks, we learn to adapt and become stronger. We see this quality in nature. Scientists have observed plant species that have adapted and grown stronger in harsh environments. In hot and dry environments, some plants have adapted by storing water in their tissues or growing deep root systems to access underground water sources. The same can be true for life experiences. Stressful events, disappointments, and failures can teach us how to adapt and become stronger. But note that it is not the suffering itself that produces resilience. Rather, it is how we frame and respond to our suffering that produces resilience. 

• Lesson #4: Our own suffering, loss, failure, and disappointment can make us more compassionate toward others.   A study conducted by Daniel Lim and David DeSteno at Northeastern University, titled “Suffering and Compassion: The Links Among Adverse Life Experiences, Empathy, Compassion, and Prosocial Behavior,” examined how past adversity influences empathy and compassion. The researchers found that individuals who have experienced significant adversity in their lives tend to have a heightened capacity for empathy, which in turn leads to increased compassion. You have probably experienced this in your own life. When you are suffering or grieving some sort of loss or disappointment, the most meaningful support often comes from those who have suffered similar experiences. I can tell you that I have great compassion for people who have lost a prize catch. 

• Lesson #5: It’s about the journey and not the destination. When I think back on that day at the coast, I can reframe the story from one of loss to one of abundance. I was at my favorite place doing the thing that I enjoy most. I slept under the stars the night before and experienced a beautiful sunny day. We caught our limit of Spanish mackerel and enjoyed great fellowship on the boat. I got the opportunity to fight and catch a glimpse of an amazing creature. Every moment of that trip was an opportunity for joy. Life is like that. It is about all the moments that we experience every day. If we focus too much on the prize, we will miss out on the beauty of everything leading up to it.

What is your cobia? What do you need to release? We all have something that we’re holding onto from our past. It might be a regret or a disappointment or a failure. Your negative thoughts are no longer serving you. Let your loss strengthen you. Find ways to reframe the experience and know that the pain you have felt has allowed you to feel the joy of other experiences more deeply. This negative experience offers you lessons if you will listen. And it is just one step along the path of a very long adventure.