Failure is the key to success

Failure can be said to be the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective or purpose, and may be viewed as the opposite of success. Without failure, there would be success. Failure is very real, but it is not an end destination -- it's another event in the course of life. Failure is not the final result of anything in life but an opportunity for us to learn and succeed.
"Success is never permanent, and failure is never final."-Mike Ditka

Early in life, we were opportune to learn about failure. As kids, we raced against each other on the field and are tested in school and given grades each year. These thus helped us to quickly learn what it means to win or lose, pass or fail. Not winning tends to have a stigma around it, and can ultimately lead to labels like “failure” or “loser.”

There are two major kinds of failure. The first one comes from never trying out our ideas because we are afraid to fail, or because we are waiting for the perfect time. This is kind of failure we can never learn from, and such timidity will destroy us. The second kind comes from a bold and venturesome spirit. If we fail in this way, the hit that we take to our reputation is greatly outweighed by what we learn. Repeated failure will toughen our spirit and show us with absolute clarity how things must be done. In fact, it is a curse to have everything go right on our first attempt.
“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.” - Paulo Coelho

It is a bit of a paradox that only failure can prepare us for dealing with failure in the future. The more unbroken success we have the more afraid we become of failing. This is not only true of people, but businesses and organizations of any sort also become more afraid of failure the more successful they become.

“We are all failures – at least the best of us are.” - J.M. Barrie
The truth that cannot be denied is the fact that failure happens to everyone. Anyone who tells us that they have always been successful is either lying or their life is so fragile that it will collapse in the event of any setback. However, the only thing that separates people who succeed from those who don’t is a proper understanding of the power of failure. Success requires that we learn from mistakes and missteps along the way rather than falling into despair and giving up. With time, I have come to realize that failure has always been our greatest teacher. Each failure pointed us in a better direction. Helped us to develop strength and authenticity. Ultimately unveiling who we were and what we were destined to become. In order to succeed, I believe we need to fail [try] over and over again.

“What is the point of being alive if you don’t at least try to do something remarkable?” – John Green
Failure is a function of making an effort. The best way to measure our progress at something is the number of setbacks and “failures” we have had. If we have not failed yet, chances are we are not trying very hard. Failure is the blacksmith’s hammer that tempers the sword of success. If we want to get really good at something, we have to fail at least a few times.

From my observations, great men and women throughout history had one main thing in common. They failed, and they failed often. Think of Thomas Edison, the great inventor, and how he failed several times to find the right filament for his light bulb. Henry Ford knew of failure intimately so much that he is quoted for saying the following: “Failure is the opportunity to begin again, more intelligently.” Clearly, failure represents opportunity and growth, not deficit and loss.

Failure is a tool that molds success.  Just as all the greats have something in common, so too do the true “failures” of life, and this is their inability to use failure as a tool to fabricate their success.
“Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.” - Denis Waitley

Experiencing one failure or hundred failures does not make us a failure. Failure is an external event that happens to every risk taker. It is not a personality characteristic. For one who fails a lot, we could say that he/she takes a lot of risks. It's important to separate the events of failure from the personal characteristic of being a failure. When we feel that drowning, setback known as failure, and we take it to heart, we empower it and diminish ourselves. We give our power away to an external event.  Success is about learning how to recognize why we failed, and how we are going to compensate for it.

This clouds the analytical process of simply looking at the results of a situation and asking ourselves, “What happened?” There are key personal questions to ask in order to learn and grow from past mistakes.
“My fault, my failure, is not in the passions I have, but in my lack of control of them.”  -Jack Kerouac
Some of these are:
·    How did I approach this?
·    What brought about the failure?
·    How prepared was I?
·    How can I use my influence to turn this failure into success?
·    What was within my control to change and what was not?
·    What can I do every day to ensure that my next try is done more intelligently?
We should be completely open and honest as we ask ourselves each question. Analyze our answers carefully and implement them while we take care of procrastination! Failure is an opportunity, not a burden. Let us be grateful for a chance to grow.
"Admit to -- and learn from -- your mistakes. Mistakes must be viewed positively... because with the knowledge you gain from them, you are able to do better in the future. So much can be accomplished with a long-term vision and resilience to short-term setbacks. Not every problem is conquered overnight, but if you persist and never give in to your mistakes, you will succeed." ~ Craig Ballantyne

I was once told that if a person has never failed, they have obviously not really tried. If we don’t fail, we have no chance at ever succeeding. So, let us remember, when we fall or when we fail, we are to dust our body off and get back into the business again until success emanates.
“Giving up is the only sure way to fail.” - Gena Showalter

Likewise, we should learn in all aspect of our lives to reject the fear of failure but to rejoice in it, because it is nothing but an opportunity for us to succeed. Life is not a short distance race but a marathon. The person who pushes the most with persistence and resilience is going to win this race. When we fail at something, we need to take a moment to celebrate that we are wiser. We are also one step closer to finally being victorious. If a successful personnel told us how many times he/she has failed in his/her life, we would be absolutely shocked. So, don’t let us stop at a point of failure but to get up and keep going.

Here is a short review of people who have failed. If you look at yourself and I look at myself, we will find many more.
“No human ever became interesting by not failing. The more you fail and recover and improve, the better you are as a person. Ever meet someone who’s always had everything work out for them with zero struggle? They usually have the depth of a puddle. Or they don’t exist.” - Chris Hardwick

While Henry Ford is today known for his innovative assembly line and American-made cars, he wasn't an instant success. In fact, his early businesses failed and left him broke five times before he founded the successful Ford Motor Company. As a young boy, Thomas Edison's teachers told him he was "too stupid to learn anything." He did not have much more success in the workplace, as he was fired from his first two jobs for not being productive. Even as an inventor, reports claim that Edison made 1,000 unsuccessful attempts at inventing the light bulb. Happily for night owls across the globe, attempt 1,001 worked out differently. Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper editor for lack of ideas. Walt Disney also went bankrupt several times before he built Disneyland. Before launching Microsoft, Bill Gates was a Harvard University dropout and co-owner of a failed business called Traf-O-Data. Driven by his passion for computer programming, Gates built what would become the world's largest software company, Microsoft.

Today the word "Albert Einstein" is synonymous with genius, but young Albert didn't speak fluently until he was nine-years-old, causing teachers to think he was slow. He was expelled from school for his rebellious nature and was refused admittance to the Zurich Polytechnic School. He went on to revolutionize science's understanding of the world, taking physics beyond its Newtonian view by developing the theory of General Relativity. He won the Nobel Prize, with his research leading the U.S. to build an atomic bomb, and influenced all aspects of culture, from religion, to art, to late-night television. Michael Jordan once said, "I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." Today, Jordan is considered one of the greatest basketball players of all time, with career stats including 6,672 rebounds, 5,633 assists, and 32,292 total points, according to NBA.com.

Same can be learned from Jack Ma. He failed three times in college. He applied thirty, 30, times to get a job but he have always been rejected. When KFC came to China for the first time, they were twenty-four, 24, to apply and he was the only one to be dismissed. He wanted to go into the police and {there were} five, 5, applicants, he was the only one not to be accepted. He applied 10 times to return to Harvard University USA and he was rejected. Jack Ma is the Creator of Alibaba and 22nd in the list of the World's wealthiest individuals according to Forbes in 2015 with $ 29.8 billion.

So, never let us give up because we failed before or the world cannot see our brilliance. We should know that failure is sometimes necessary to reach our intended end [goal]!! As a matter of fact, that same failure can be the fuel that drives us to our ultimate success. Let us give ourselves permission to be different and allow failure to be our fuel to energize our engine of success.

 “You must make a decision that you are going to move on. It won’t happen automatically. You will have to rise up and say, ‘I don’t care how hard this is, I don’t care how disappointed I am, I’m not going to let this get the best of me. I’m moving on with my life.” -Joel Osteen,