Failing is the event. The sentence you say to yourself afterward is the real result.

The event itself is usually brief and fairly neutral, in that something did not work. What follows shapes everything after it, because the sentence you produce about yourself decides whether there is a next attempt at all. Two people can have exactly the same bad afternoon and end up in very different years.

Notice the words that turn up automatically once something goes wrong. Say the accurate version instead, which is nearly always about what happened rather than about who you are. Then choose the next step while the sentence is still fair.