Fail your way to success.

How often do you fail? A lot? Some? Hardly ever? If you can't remember the last time you messed up, then I kindly suggest you haven't been trying hard enough. It's a maxim of life that you will fail far more than you will succeed. Watch a young child learning to walk. They will face plant over and over and over and over, then somehow balance on their legs ... and fall on their back. But, once they learn the tricks of motion, they are running all over the place. Do they remember the falls? Maybe, but it's far beneath the joys of getting where they want to go.

Thomas Edison famously reported 10,000 failures before inventing the light bulb. It's incredible the things he tried, yet each attempt brought him closer to understanding how the system worked and what he eventually needed to make it work. If he'd given up, then someone else surely would have completed the invention and gotten the credit. "Failure is success in progress," Albert Einstein. Oliver Goldsmith added, "Success consists of getting up one more time than you fall."

Failure is good for you. Failure teaches fortitude, honesty toward yourself, and determination. Do you want to succeed? Then, push through the feelings of despair and get moving! Don't let yourself wallow in the mire. Square your shoulders, bite back your curses, lift your eyes and focus on your goal. If it's easy, then the reward matters very little. Struggle, press forward, and win your prize. Don't worry about failing. Focus on the goal line and don't sweat the small stuff.

- M