Ive had many failures and it is due to trying to do a block I like and make a quilt on my own. Or trying something complicated to soon. My first quilts were stack the deck and they turned out nice.
Go to quilterstv and watch videos of the experts
I also found that using patterns by Eleanor Burns are hard to do wrong. She has videos on her website Quilt In A Day.
Keep it simple and do small quilts until you learn all the tricks and simple ways of doing things.