If You’ve Never Failed, You’re Not On The Road To Success

September 28, 2012 in Success with 6 Comments

Road To Success - Failure

Most Fridays mean a Just For Fun video, picture, or thought on the Live It Forward blog. Not today! We’re still doing a video, but today is all about your road to success.

Ever feel stuck on your road to success? Worse…ever feel like you’ve hit a dead end? Even worse than that…ever feel like you’ve taken a u-turn and instead of traveling the road to success, you’re journeying down the path to failure?

There are a lot of great quotes, articles, and books about “failing forward” and turning missteps into success. In fact, here are some of my favorite quotes on the subject:

 The better a man is, the more mistakes he will make, for the more new things he will try. I would never promote to a top-level job a man who was not making mistakes…otherwise he is sure to be mediocre.—Peter Drucker

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing. —George Bernard Shaw

You always pass failure on the road to success. —Mickey Rooney

People fail forward to success. —Mary Kay Ash

No man ever achieved worthwhile success who did not, at one time or other, find himself with at least one foot hanging well over the brink of failure. —Napoleon Hill

The difference between average people and achieving people is their perception of and response to failure…In life, the question is not if you will have problems, but how you are going to deal with your problems. Are you going to fail forward or backward?   —John C. Maxwell

All inspiring quotes! But when it comes to inspiration, nothing hits me more than being reminded of how many historical figures overcame and used their failures to gain access to the road to success.

 

 If You’ve Never Failed, You’re Probably Not Traveling The Road To Success

Question: How has experiencing failure helped you along your road to success? Encourage others by sharing your story.

 

 

  • http://twitter.com/jeremiahdmartin Jeremiah Martin

    Awhile back I ran a website designed to help independent up and coming bands. At the end of the summer my goal was to host a big concert and bring in a national act as well as local bands. The event was a flop and I lost over $250 because I still had to pay the bands. A few years later I was hired on a media campaign to organize events, create hype for the product, and coordinate release parties throughout my state. After a month or so without leads and events falling through, I was finally fired from the campaign. Despite these failures, I still have a passion for organizing, coordinating, and planning. Only time will tell what the future holds.

    • http://www.liveitforward.com/ Kent Julian

      Thanks for sharing, Jeremiah. The key is to continue to learn from each setback. To figure out what didn’t work and why. To look for different and creative ways to turn your passion into profit.

      Best to you along the journey!

  • http://www.intentionallegacy.com/ Randell Mark Olson

    Kent, I Love that video, It puts all of us who have failed in some pretty good company. I have had so many failures over the years that it’s hard to pin point just one, but I always try and learn from each one, and keep my eye on the bigger picture.

    I appreciate this post because it’s a great reminder to focus on the future, only look back long enough to learn from our past mistakes, and gain encouragement from our past victories.

    • http://www.liveitforward.com/ Kent Julian

      Learning from the past and applying it to the future…that’s “live it forward” in a nutshell. Thanks for commenting, Randell!

  • Reckless Housewife

    Well, hello Kent Julian! I’m new here. I have read your frequent, positive comments over at Alana Mokma’s Musings of a Shiny Penny and decided to pop over. So glad I clicked on that link! My failures are M-A-N-Y, but a recent failure in my hobby is teaching me a good life lesson. I play roller derby, and I recently had a meaty failure in the form of the slow, long, downward spiral of my mental game (which eventually leaked into the game I was playing on the track). It’s far too long of a story to post here, but I’ve fleshed it out on my blog for anyone interrested. To summarize, I realized I had been asking myself the wrong questions. Instead of continuing to ask myself if I was the weakest link on my team (such a scary question to ask and answer), I decided to ask a new question. The new question was “Do I want to be a part of the chain (my team)?” Yes! I want to play!!!! It was a lightbulb moment that completely changed my focus and freed me to get my head back in the game.

    • http://www.liveitforward.com/ Kent Julian

      What a great question, Cindy! You’re so right, it completely changes the paradigm. Fantastic!!