Failure is the highway to success. Tom Watson Sr. said, “If you want to succeed, double your failure rate”. If you study history, you will find that all stories of success are also stories of great failures. But people don’t see the failures. They only see one side of the picture and they say that person got lucky: “He must have been at the right place at the right time”. Let me share someone’s life history with you. This was a man who failed in business at the age of 21; was defeated in a legislative race at age 22; failed again in business at age 24; overcame the death of his sweetheart at age 26; had a nervous breakdown at age 27; lost a congressional race at age 34; lost a senatorial race at age 45; failed in an effort to become vice-president at age 47; lost a senatorial race at age 49; and was elected president of the United States at age 52. This man was Abraham Lincoln. Would you call him a failure? He could have quit. But to Lincoln, defeat was a detour and not a dead end. Successful people don’t do great things; they only do small things in a great way. They succeeded in spite of problems, not in the absence of them. But to the outside world, it appears as though they just got lucky. All success stories are stories of great failures. The only difference is that every time failed, they bounced back. This is called failing forward, rather than backward. You learn and move forward. Learn from your failure and keep going. In 1914, Thomas Edison, at age 67, lost his factory, which was worth a few million dollars, to fire. It had very little insurance. He said, “There is great value in disaster. All our mistakes are burn up. Thank god we can start a new”. Below are more examples of the failures of successful people: Thomas Edison failed approximately 10,000 times while he was working on the light bulb. Henry Ford was broke at the age of 40. Lee Iacocca was fired by Henry Ford II at the age of 54. Young Beethoven was told that he had no talent for music, but he gave some of the best music to the world. Setbacks are inevitable in life. A setback act as driving force and also teach us humility. In grief you will find courage and faith to overcome the setback. We need to learn to become victors, not victims. Fear and doubt short- circuit the mind. Ask yourself after every setback: What did I learn from this experience? Only then will you be able to turn a stumbling block into a stepping stone. A man can fail many times, but he isnt a failure until he begins to blame somebody else. Dont be afraid to fail. Dont waste energy trying to cover up failure. Learn from your failures and go on to the next challenge. Its OK to fail. If youre not failing, youre not growing. IF YOU THINK If you think you are beaten, you are. If you think you dare not, you don’t! If you like to win, but think you can’t, it’s almost a cinch you won’t. If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost; For out in the world we find success begins with a fellow’s will; It’s all in the state of mind. If you think you are outclassed, you are, you have to think high to rise, You’ve got to be sure of yourself before you can ever win a prize. Life’s battles don’t always go to the faster and stronger man, But sooner or later the man, who wins, is the man who thinks he can. WIN AS IF YOU WERE USED TO IT, LOSE AS IF YOU ENJOYED IT FOR A CHANGE
Posted on: Mon, 04 Nov 2013 05:31:30 +0000
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