"Failure is the habit of quitting when one is overtaken by temporary defeat" This is how Napoleon Hill's book "
Think and Grow Rich" defined
failure. In some part of the first chapter of the book, tells a story of
R.U. Darby with his uncle who entered gold mining business. In the story, Darby and his uncle went west to dig and bought a machinery for the mining operation, whose fund came from their relatives. After striking the first ore, they shipped it to a smelter and the returns proved that they had one of the richest mines in Colorado that time. Down went the drill, something happened, the vein of gold disappeared and
hopes are gone which lead them to
discouragement and
decided to quit. To pay their debts, He sold the machinery to a junkman, which happens to be smart. The junkman consult a mining engineer and found that the vein of gold would be just
three feet from where Darbys stopped drilling. The junkman took millions of dollars in ore from the mine because of his wise counsel.
Mr. Darby paid back every dollar to his relatives and even neighbors, Long afterwards before he recouped what he loss. Mr Darby discovered a strength from his failure, he went into selling life insurance to people which he applied his philosophy of persistence and positive attitude.He always say to himself " I stopped three feet from gold, but I will never stop because men say "NO" when I ask them to buy insurance" . He owes his 'stickability' to the lesson he learned from his 'quitability' in the gold mining business. Mr. Darby became the most successful insurance salesmen in his time.
Before success comes to most people, they are overwhelmed by temporary defeat. When
faced with defeat the easiest and most logical thing to do so is to
quit which is exactly most of the people do nowadays.
Most of successful people in their times and nowadays has told that their greatest success and achievements came just one step beyond the point at which defeat had overtaken them.
Sometimes, it takes a huge amount of effort to turn the wheel and make things right. So, to remember that
every failure is a key step to success. Keep moving forward.