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The Successful Person’s Secret: Failure Guards the Road That Leads to Success

failure, how to succeed

A few years ago, I shared a story with you on here about a new bank president who learned a valuable lesson from with his predecessor about the key to success…

The 5 Words That Reveal the Key to Success

The story is told of a new bank president who met with his predecessor and said, “I would like to know what have been the keys to your success.”

The older gentleman looked at him and replied, “Young man, I can sum it up in two words: Good decisions.”

To that the young man responded, “I thank you immensely for that advice, sir, but how does one come to know which are the good decisions?”

One word, young man,” replied the sage. “Experience.”

That’s all well and good,” said the younger, “but how does one get experience?”
Two words,” said the elder. “Bad decisions.

Plans for victory are never guaranteed.

The only way to achieve success is through experience. And experience only comes through failure.

Someone once asked Paul Harvey, the famous journalist and radio commentator, to reveal the secret of his success. He said, “I get up when I fall down.”

A New Definition of an Expert

Until you try something, you’re an amateur.

You only become good at anything through trial and error. And through that sequence you learn and gain new skills.

Most people define an expert as someone who is “better or smarter than me in a specific arena.”

But here’s a new definition of an expert for you…

An expert is someone who has failed more times in one specific area than everyone else. <– Click here to tweet this!

This infographic from Zintro shows exactly why I define an expert this way…

10000-hour-rule-gladwell-outliers13

I am telling you this, because we have to gain a new view of failure and success, if we want to move from failure to success in any arena.

We have to realize that the road to success is marked by repeated failures, hard-earned lessons, and stubborn determination.

When we realize this, then we’ll stop beating ourselves up when we fail or fall.

And instead, we’ll realize that the only way to win in any arena is to lose enough times that we gain the knowledge and skills to be a success.

I think we need to see life and failing more like a unique man named Stephen Jepson sees life.

Watch this interview with Jepson from GrowingBolder.com

Jepson’s whole attitude about life is one of treating it all as a game. That’s how he’s become better.

The reason his health is so good and his mind and coordination are so good is because of how he treats his failures.

He treats it all as a game. He doesn’t beat himself up when he fails.

That why to him it’s all exquisite, beautiful and wonderful.

I don’t know if you’ve heard of this, but there’s a whole concept that’s popular now that’s called “Gamification”.

It’s the application of typical elements of game playing to other areas of life like: education, business, goal setting and more.

It doesn’t mean that you don’t take these things seriously.

You do, but how you approach them is how you’d approach a game.

 

Do you see it? Stephen Jepson doesn’t beat himself up when he fails.

He isn’t surprised about his failures any more than a gamer is surprised at their failures when they play a video game that they want conquer.

As M.H. Alderson said, “Success is getting up just one more time than you fall down. If at first you don’t succeed, you are running about average.”

Let’s not seek after failure, but let’s also not look at it as something to be feared anymore. Click here to tweet this!

Failure guards the road that leads to success. <– Click here to tweet this!

Only those who are brave enough to look failure in the eye will discover the knowledge and the skills it possesses to show us the way to success.

There is no lasting success without failure.

Remember: Failure doesn’t automatically lead to success.

Otherwise all failures would eventually be successes!

It’s only when we learn from failure and learn how to avoid or conquer it that it opens the gate to success.

That’s why it’s more important than ever to conquer the distractions and focus on the areas you’re willing to fail in more than others, so you can become the expert that they will never be,

That’s why it’s important to focus on the types of effort that are worth investing our time in.

If you haven’t signed up to watch my free video yet, then you can do that below…

The Four Kinds of Effort, Four Kinds of Results

There are four basic types of effort that produce four different results in our life.

Because of fear of failure, many people end up focusing on three of these these types of effort, but only a few brave ones focus on the fourth kind.

And those people who do, experience a different kind of results than the rest of us.

If you’d like to learn more about these four different types of effort and the four different results, then sign-up below and you can watch a video that I created for you that’s all about these thing.

This FREE Video Will Reveal

In this 19:27 minute video, you’ll discover:

  • What we can learn about the type of effort we need to focus on from one of the most dominant players in American college basketball history
  • What the four basic types are and why only two of them are the ones we should be focusing on, if we want to see new and better results
  • The important truth we need to realize about our daily rituals
  • 7 questions you need to ask yourself about your daily rituals
  • 3 basic areas we should focus on, if we want to fight off the daily thieves and get new and better results
  • And more

Plus by signing up, you’ll be the first to know about two other videos that I’ll be posting where you’ll learn more about how to get unstuck and get more done. 

They are a part of a 3-video series I’m calling, “The Dangers of a Busy Life”.

Here are some of the things I’ll share in these two other videos:

  • The power of doing nothing
  • Why we need to become “misers of moments”
  • Why we also need to beware of the barrenness of a busy life
  • The only antidote for interruption
  • Why we need to move from amateur to artist when it comes to how we handle time
  • And more

And through all of this, you’ll learn more about my simple solution that will help any of us to become more focused, more effective, and more creative and how you can begin using it in your life.

Photo by jeffdjevdet

 

About Scott Aughtmon (1958 Articles)
I’m author of the book 51 Content Marketing Hacks. I am also a regular contributor to ContentMarketingInstitute.com and I am the person behind the popular infographic 21 Types of Content We Crave. I’m a business strategist, consultant, content creation specialist, and speaker. I’ve been studying effective marketing and business methods (both online and offline) since 1999. ===> If you would like to see ways that we could work together, then please click here to learn more.