Shah Rukh Khan: Failure is lonely, feels like crap

While Shah Rukh Khan today is an uber-successful global superstar, the actor has always been mindful of his humble beginnings. SRK, who has seen a lot of successes and a few failures, in a recent interview with GQ opened up about the his first failure, and what failing feels like.

The actor in the interview got candid about his first brush with failure and revealed, "I remember running a 100-metre race in school (at St Columba’s, Delhi), against boys who were a little older than me. Till that point, I’d been running with boys my age and I was used to being in the lead. In that race, though, I came fifth out of six or seven boys. As soon as the race was over, the school officials rushed over to the winners and whisked them off to the podium. There were people around, but no one came to me. It was the emptiest feeling."

When further prodded about his early years, and the loss of his parents at an early age, the actor added, "I’m 51. I lost my dad when I was 14 or 15, and my mother when I was 25. That void never gets filled. If you lose your parents too early, you have to grow up too fast. You can’t play with toys, you have to start playing in the real world. I play with my children’s toys now. People find it odd and think perhaps I’m just a good father, but that’s not true. I’m just a father who didn’t have toys."

Shah Rukh, who has tasted both success and failure also opened up about failing, and said that 'failure feels like crap,' The actor further added, "If you fail repeatedly at something, it can tell you that perhaps you’re not cut out for it. It can make you look at a situation more carefully, so you avoid repeating certain mistakes. It strips you of arrogance and can shake you out of your complacency. It can make you more humble and focused. But I think we say these things to make ourselves feel better, because the truth is, failure feels like crap. But it’s also inevitable."

Signing off the actor added, "Failure is a process of emotional detoxification. Failure is something you face alone. Success has a lot of masters, friends, and well-wishers. But failure is lonely. Still, it’s just as textured as a success."