One thing everyone must
learn is the need to persist when it is difficult. When we experience defeat
and rejection, the easiest and most logical thing to do is to quit, but the
successful have learned to persist. 
One of my favourite stories is about Colonel Sanders the founder of Kentucky
Fried Chicken (KFC) before it was one of the world’s largest restaurants,
Colonel Sanders drove all across the country from restaurant to restaurant
cooking batches of chicken for restaurant owners and their employees looking
for someone willing to purchase his chicken recipe. Colonel Sanders persisted
through 1,009 rejections until he got a ‘yes’
After his first ‘yes,’ his franchising idea began to take off. By 1964,
at age 74, Colonel Sanders had more than 600 franchised outlets for his chicken
in the United States and Canada, and he sold his interest in the U.S. Company
for $2 million ($13 million in 2006 dollars). KFC now does billions in
sales each year and serves millions of customers daily in over 13,000
restaurants in 80 countries. To me, there are no failures
in life, only those who quit before success. Failure is a part
of learning
Listen to Sam Walton, the
founder of WalMart, after he lost
his first store, a Ben Franklin variety store, after 5 years of hard work. “It
was the low point of my business life. I felt sick to my stomach. I couldn’t
believe it was happening to me. It really was a nightmare. I had built the best
variety store in the whole region and worked hard in the community—done
everything right—and now I was being kicked out of town. It didn’t seem fair. .
. I’ve always thought of problems as challenges, and this one wasn’t any
different. . . The challenge at hand was simple enough to figure out: I had
to pick myself up and get on with it, do it all over again, only even better
this time. . . I had a chance for a brand-new start, and this time I
knew what I was doing” The last time I checked, Walmart market
value is about $230 billion.
Calvin Coolidge make it point blank “Nothing in
this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more
common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is
almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts.
Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan "press
on" has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race”.
Plato wrote the first sentence of his famous
Republic nine different ways before he was satisfied. Cicero practiced speaking
before friends every day for thirty years to perfect his elocution. Noah
Webster laboured 36 years writing his dictionary, crossing the Atlantic twice
to gather material. Milton rose at 4:00 am every day in order to have enough
hours for his Paradise Lost. Gibbon spent 26 years on his Decline and Fall of
the Roman Empire. Bryant rewrote one of his poetic masterpieces 99 times before
publication, and it became a classic.
It is said that Thomas Edison performed 50,000
(sic) experiments before he succeeded in producing a storage battery. We might
assume the famous inventor would have had some serious doubts along the way.
But when asked if he ever became discouraged working so long without results,
Edison replied, "Results? Why, I know 50,000 things that won't work."
When you fill like
quitting: Remember all of those who said you’d fail, remember there’re too many
people you need to prove wrong, remember you have too much to fight for, remember why you started, and remember what
you’re doing it for. Also remember pain is temporary, greatness last forever,
remember that the pain you feel today, will be replaced with the strength you
need tomorrow. Remember that every ounce of pain you feel is building a
stronger you, a stronger body, a stronger mind and a stronger character. So push
through the pain. Don’t let it stop you, force it to grow you. Don’t back-down
from the pain, FACE IT! I say FACE IT HEAD ON!! PUSH HARDER!!!
The Nugget: The formula for success is trying until you succeed. If you give up during the struggle, you will never experience the victory.
