Failure, Mother of Success

Many think failure is a word only known to the poor and needy that we see every day, the handicapped who can hardly support themselves, the illiterates who didn’t succeed in the academia, people who are rejected in one way or the other, and other people who failed to succeed politically, socially, economically and otherwise. How wrong they can be!

Who would have believed that a child born into poverty to a teenage single mother, who was raped at nine and became pregnant at 14, will ever become anything meaningful in life? But there she is year after year in the world billionaire’s list (Forbes list), one of the most influential women in the world Oprah Winfrey. Her story today elates the ears of many; we all celebrate her success and forget where she came from. She was born without even an aluminium spoon, yes, but with determination look where she is now. 

That surely tells you that it’s not your deficiency that limits you. The only possible limit in life is one’s self. That little voice that tells you it is impossible to be the best, that Mr A will always be better than you, that my friend is the only factor limiting you. Maybe you have stayed at the bottom of the class, or achieved little or nothing when your mates are making headlines, or you have failed woefully in several ways, who says you will remain a failure? Even if someone said so I tell you they lied because the only time you can be labelled a failure is when you stop trying. The life of my mentor, the famous Ben Carson reassures me of this fact.

“I had been in the fifth grade not even two weeks before everyone considered me the dumbest kid in the class and made frequently made jokes about me.”…Ben Carson (Book: Think Big)

This was part of the unfortunate beginnings of Ben Carson; who was once undoubtedly a failure. Did he remain a failure? No he didn’t, he engineered his life towards excellence and success pursued him. By the time he was 33 his story has changed, he became the Director of Paediatric Neurosurgery in renowned John Hopkins hospital, the youngest major division director in Johns Hopkins history. There are so many other people who started from nothing and today they are celebrated. Why can’t you be celebrated as well???

Yes, you can be celebrated as well, but can you pay the price? Success has only one price “excellence”. In whatever you do, seek to do it well, to do it the best way possible, and watch how success finds you. Dear friend, it is high time you stopped hoping and wishing for a better tomorrow, it is time to actually take today in your hand and mould it to a better tomorrow. Challenges are bound to come in form of failure, but instead of allowing these challenges to demoralize you, you could use them as a source of motivation. Yeah you heard me right…when it doesn’t work, you go back find out why it didn’t work, fix it and try again.

Gradually you will achieve excellence and trust me when you do that success will pursue you *pants down* only then will you understand that failure can be the mother of success.