Stepping Stones

“Like success, failure is many things to many people. With Positive Mental Attitude, failure is a learning experience, a rung on the ladder, a plateau at which to get your thoughts in order and prepare to try again.” - W. Clement Stone

Many of us are afraid of failing, at least some of the time, but that should not be the case really. Fear of failure (also called "atychiphobia") is when we allow that fear to stop us from doing the things that can move us forward to achieve our goals.

Rarely do we learn from our successes. Rather, it is our failures that challenge us and teach us the most. From failure, we learn to strategize. We learn to think outside the box, to look for new angles and search in new directions. Perhaps Henry Ford explains it better: “Failure can either be a stepping stone to success or a stumbling to defeat.”

Let me embellish it further. “Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure. You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because remember that’s where you’ll find success.” Michael Jordan

Who on earth would believe Bill Gates, one of the most influential business executives in the United States Of America and the world over would have his name written in world history after he failed to complete Harvard University. Gates actually dropped out of university (HE FAILED to complete).

Bill Gates, born in 1955, is an American business executive, who serves as chairman of Microsoft Corporation, the leading computer software company in the United States. Gates cofounded Microsoft in 1975 with high school friend Paul Allen. The company’s success made Gates one of the most influential figures in the computer industry and, eventually, one of the richest people in the world.

Born in Seattle, Washington, William Henry Gates III attended public school through the sixth grade. In the seventh grade, he entered Seattle’s exclusive Lakeside School, where he met Allen. Gates was first introduced to computers and programming languages in 1968 when he was in the eighth grade. That year Lakeside bought a teletype machine that connected to a mainframe computer over phone lines. At the time, the school was one of the few that provided students with access to a computer.

Soon afterward, Gates, Allen, and other students convinced a local computer company to give them free access to its PDP-10, a new minicomputer made by Digital Equipment Corporation. In exchange for the computer time, the students tried to find flaws in the system. Gates spent much of his free time on the PDP-10 learning programming languages such as BASIC, FORTRAN, and LISP. In 1972, Gates and Allen founded Traf-O-Data, a company that designed and built computerized car-counting machines for traffic analysis. The project introduced them to the programmable 8008 microprocessor from Intel Corporation.

While attending Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1975, Gates teamed with Allen to develop a version of the BASIC programming language for the Altair 8800, the first personal computer. They licensed the software to the manufacturer of the Altair, Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS), and formed Microsoft (originally Micro-soft) to develop versions of BASIC for other computer companies. Gates decided to drop out of Harvard in his junior year to devote his time to Microsoft. In 1980, Microsoft closed a pivotal deal with International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) to provide the operating system for the IBM PC (personal computer). As part of the deal, Microsoft retained the right to license the operating system to other companies.

It is possible Gates may have been insulted, described as ‘stupid’, ‘foolish’ or even ‘mad’ apparently by some friends and loved ones for having decided to drop out of Harvard University. Most people may have called him FAILURE simply because he chose to walk out of Harvard. Whatever it is, one thing is obvious: Gates and his friend were resolute, purposeful and undaunted in pursuit of achieving their heart desires regardless of what others may have said about them. This life is a serious journey, and in order to ensure safe arrival, you have to close your ears to the crowd sometimes.

As a matter of fact, many of us have allowed many opportunities to silently slip out of our fingers because of what others around us would say.

Gates has made personal investments in other high-technology companies. He sits on the board of one Biotechnology Company and has invested in a number of others. In 1989, he founded Corbis Corporation, which now owns the largest collection of digital images in the world.

In the late 1990s, Gates became more involved in philanthropy. With his wife, he established the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which, ranked by assets, quickly became the largest foundation in the world. Gates has also authored two books: The Road Ahead (1995; revised, 1996), which details his vision of technology’s role in society, and Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999), which discusses the role technology can play in running a business.

Gates took advantage of his inability to complete University to pursue other equally productive ventures. His failure was actually a STEPPING STONE to his ultimate desire – his passion.

The fact that you failed at doing ‘A’ does not necessarily mean you will fail at ‘B’. That would be a negative image to the highest degree, until you get rid of those cobwebs in your mind never expects to experience any change in your life.

I have over the years tried and still trying to find the real difference between failure and success. Failure (an undesired outcome of something) is just part of the larger process of life – the process of learning and growing.

Have you noticed that some people – contrary to our belief system and expectation – seem to be very vibrant and stronger when they fail to achieve something? How do they manage? If you pay close attention, you will observe, people of such calibre have developed a unique mindset - they have it in mind that failure is an integral and intrinsic part of success.

It is their belief system anytime they failed to achieve something, they are learning from their mistakes rather than lamenting over them just like some of us often do. The real difference between failure and success is that of a message that has it that, something could have been done differently – that is to say, there is always more room for improvement after failure. Hence the reason some people don’t seem to care anytime the fail. They don’t see failures as an isolated issue or event however as part of a much larger process.

In life, failures are not really an end as most of us thought; they are just STEPPING STONES – they are only as permanent as you see and allow them to be. You can only be dictated to, they are not final unless you agree and accept defeat and stop trying.

According to Napoleon Hill, success can only be attained by those who keep trying – and of course with POSITIVE MENTAL ATTITUDE. Most of the times, many people see failure as trying events, tools of the devil, or trials and temptation sent by God to torment us for our sins, iniquities and wrongdoings. Remember, God does not tempt neither can He be tempted by man. You are only being dictated to by your thoughts – your mindset. The devil is not all that powerful as you perceive him to be.

Failure comes in everyday life as people struggle and fails attempting to chase their dreams and make those dreams become reality. The industry of care including education is the greatest example of failing to succeed. Teachers daily attempt new ideas, new methods trying to get the attention of a growingly impatient I-pod generation. These teachers create lesson plans, study and attempt creative ideas which fail a majority of the time. However, their success breeds when just one of those methods works and the kids become engaged and learning moments occur. These teachers have a relentless life of self-examination and must deal with their failing daily. However, they never quit and always look at each failing as an opportunity to find the next success. When dealing with kids everyday emotions and dramas teachers are often personally affected by the shortcomings of student’s achievement blaming themselves for not figuring out the way to reach this kid or that kid and help them pass the standardized test which controls their futures.

There are many other examples of how people’s failures have created their goals. Edison once said: "Many of life's failure are men who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up" This is sound advice from the man who many called crazy and incapable as his first inventions failed. He later became one of the greatest inventors of a generation. The key ingredient in success is perseverance. Perseverance is a subtly powerful phenomenon. When times are tough and it feels like you are losing everything you may actually be one step away from your great success. If you have the courage to keep on the track you are on and finish what you started until your goals and ambitions come true you will find that all the failures leading up to your success were necessary components in preparing you for dealing with the pressures of being a successful person. Goal setting is a great catalyst for enthusiastic approaches to success but dealing with failure and learning to use that failure to improve the self and use it as a preparatory device is a priceless lesson that George Washington, Edison, Bishop T. D. Jakes, Pastor Mensa Otabil, Duncan Williams, John Kuffour, Atta Mills and the millions of great teachers and Leaders around the world have learned and turned into success.

It is a known fact that repeated efforts lead to success. Life is a long journey and in the course of life and career, one has to face many ups and downs. One can meet several troubles and obstacles on the way of life but should not be disheartened on these situations. Sometimes one gets a success and sometimes failure. Failures give a better point of view through which we can march our way onto success. So we should always regard failure as the first step or stepping stone to success.

The story of King Bruce greatly epitomizes the saying that Failure is a Stepping Stone to success. King Bruce lost a battle and his enemies took his kingdom. He wanted to fight the enemies back, therefore; organized a very large army. He fought against his enemies many times and lost. This actually happened eight times and the eighth time he lost very heavily and so he was hiding in a cave. He was very dejected and disheartened and then he saw a spider trying to build a web. The spider could not link the web at a particular point and he tried a number of times and finally built it successfully. On looking at this, the king thought, “If a spider can try so many times, I can also do it”. He immediately started organizing an empire and finally he won.

People who fail to learn from their past mistakes are always bound to repeat the same mistakes. There is always a second chance after failure, however, that depends on how you see the failure - Stepping stones or stumbling blogs.

I would want to end my article with this inspiring quote by Halle Berry: “I never wanted to be a model. My modeling career was nothing but a stepping stone to my acting career and that's all I ever saw it as. A pointless rock in the river that has to be stepped on in order to get to the meaningful oasis of acting.”

Failure is indeed a stepping stone, a lesson along the way. It is the opportunity to learn and grow, to take a different route, to see things in a new light.

You are winning if you don’t quit!
By: Analimbey, Adobe-Rah ChrisStepping Stones
Email: analimbeychris@gmail.com

Follow me on twitter: @analimbeychris