Many girls today, particularly firstborn girls, try to live up to impossible expectations. Be it with grades, in sports, or in other parts of life, they feel they must always win and can never fail. In fact, learning to fail gracefully is a key skill to take through life.

Admitting Failure

Teen girls might not want even to admit failure, and they need to. Parents need to message from the start that failure is a part of life. Everyone who has ever gone out on a limb or stretched her abilities has failed at some time or another. Encourage your daughter to talk about failures and to discuss the situation with someone else. Share stories about the times you've failed, not just at her age but in recent memory. Show her that you can move past failure and still be a successful person. You might want to even use a little humor here. But don't make fun. Be sure to remember that the particular failure is a disappointment to her, so belittling it is not an answer. You may also want to point out to your daughter ways she could have handled the situation differently, like asking for help. You'd be surprised how many girls are afraid to ask for help in failing situations.

Owning Failure

Your daughter needs to own — or accept responsibility for — her failures as well. Let's say she decided to not do her homework in English class. She got an A on every paper she did and test she took, but the five zeroes from not doing homework dragged her grade down to a C-. Some parents today might want to storm the school, meet with the teacher, and find a way out for their daughter so her poor grade does not mar her college transcript. But the reality is, it is her grade. Better that you let her see the grade on paper and not get on the honor roll. She needs to feel the consequences of her failure in order to learn from it. This is not always easy for a parent to do.

It can be particularly hard for a high-achieving girl to admit failures of any kind. This can lead to lying. If you find your “good girl” is lying to you about things, you will need to talk to her about the value of honesty, and the respect one can get from owning up to a failure or mistake. Remind her: it doesn't all magically become okay when she admits failures, but it does show strong character, and that's a win in an otherwise losing situation. In the end, every experience a teen girl has is a learning experience. If she can learn that she will falter but that if she admits it, embraces it, and learns from it, she's really still moving toward being that successful adult she (and you) want her to be, failure can become something she just deals with. If she can learn to fail gracefully, admitting and accepting her mistake and working to make it better, she'll have a skill many adults don't even have.