Try, Try and Try again.

As the saying goes if at first you don't succeed then try, try, and try again...  Failure is a perception of the mind. If you think you are a failure then you will become a failure.  Once that seed is planted in the subconscious mind it can be difficult to uproot from your mind.  There are some things we are naturally not good at nevertheless with determination and effort that can change.   When you do something and you don't get the result you want, its' best not to look at it as a failure but as feedback to actions taken or not taken that gave you the result that you got.  Sometimes things are not within your control.  That is feedback too.  It is important how you look at this feedback.  Thomas Edison's teacher told him that he was too stupid to learn anything he went on to invent the light bulb.  Oprah Winfrey quote “There is no such thing as failure. Failure is just life trying to move us in another direction.”  Michael Jordan’s famous quote "I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game-winning shot, and I missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

You’ve heard the old mantra “life is not easy” or “who said it would be easy” It is just a fact of life that some of us have to try harder in certain things.  Some of us can read a page once quickly and get the gist of the contents straight away.  I need to read it twice and probably a third time to be sure.  I accept that.  We need to know our limitations as they are set by our natural ability.

If it is the case that you are not being successful at what you are attempting to be successful at then you may need to stop and evaluate your approach.  One thing that will be for certain is that you will need to adjust your approach because what you are doing isn’t getting you the result that you would like.  This can be challenging especially if you feel you've invested a lot of time and effort in the actions you've taken.   The bottom line is that you need to be honest with yourself and call the cards as they are.  A bit of self-reflection will be needed before you can start thinking about your options for your next approach.

I once heard a story of a man and his family who relocated from one part of America to another part of the country in search of digging gold and getting a piece of the gold rush opportunities that were prominent at the time.  The man bought himself a pick and a shovel and then went to work.  For weeks he worked hard without finding anything.   His belief kept him going until he saw a shiny nugget where he was digging. He covered the mine stream where he saw the gold and went back and told his family and a few neighbours because he needed to raise money to buy machinery to bring the gold to the surface.   The reward from the gold was great at first until the gold dried up. The man kept drilling for a few more weeks until failure overtook his desire and belief.  The man-made the decision with the other stakeholders to sell the digging machine and mine.  He sold the machinery and mine to a junkyard owner.  The junkyard wasn't a silly man and went to seek advice about the mine.  He knew a mining expert who advises him that the man who sold him the mine had little knowledge of mine stream because if he had kept digging he would strike gold again but this time in a lot more abundance.   The expert said that the man was 3 feet away from the gold but he gave up.  The junkyard man made millions of dollars from the mine.  The man who originally owned the mine heard of the junkyard man's success and decide to embed the 3 feet away from the gold lesson into his life.  The man then used this lesson to become one of the most successful people in the insurance business.

It is said failure is often ironic because it has a cunning way of tripping us up when we are not far from success.  We are all guilty of giving up after a few failed attempts.  Successful people have failed many times in their endeavors. The failure didn't stop them from carrying on but instead they learn from the failure and improve their other future attempt until they succeeded in their goal.

Finally I will end how I started… If at first you don’t succeed then try and try and try again. In conjunction with that practice makes perfect.