Great Failures .....

There are innumerable examples of people who persisted inspite of their early failures.

Remember Margaret Mitchell of 'Gone With The Wind' fame Her novel suffered thirty four rejections before it was accepted for publishing. The early rejections doesn't make her a failure, does it

Failures are simply others' opinions of our actions. As Dr.Wayne Dyer says, it is only a judgement. I think he is right. If you know that you have a winnable idea, persist with it, just as the original recipe holder of Kentucy Fried Chicken did. The recipe was rejected repeatedly, before being accepted.

And persistence does pay, just ask Steve Jobs.

Refusing to Accept Failure

Sir Edmund Hillary was the first man to climb Mount Everest. On May 29, 1953 he scaled the highest mountain then known to man-29,000 feet straight up. He was knighted for his efforts. He even made American Express card commercials because of it! However, until we read his book, High Adventure, we do not understand that Hillary had to grow into this success.

You see, in 1952 he attempted to climb Mount Everest, but failed. A few weeks later a group in England asked him to address its members. Hillary walked on stage to a thunderous applause. The audience was recognizing an attempt at greatness, but Edmund Hillary saw himself as a failure. He moved away from the microphone and walked to the edge of the platform. He made a fist and pointed at a picture of the mountain. He said in a loud voice, "Mount Everest, you beat me the first time, but I'll beat you the next time because you've grown all you are going to grow... but I'm still growing!"

Mark Victor Hansen and his friend, Jack Canfield, had an idea to write a book of short stories that would touch the souls of many people. After the book was written the title seemed to be not quite right. So he went into meditation and asked for guidance about a title. He wanted the book to be special, to captivate the imagination of the public, so the title was critical. He went to bed each night with the phrase in his mind: Mega bestseller .

What Do You Do When You Are Turned Down 134 Times

After a few days, Hanson woke up with the phrase Chicken Soup in his mind. He didn't understand until he remembered that his mom had always made him chicken soup when he was sick. After more contemplation, the final title was born: Chicken Soup for the Soul . Everybody he shared this title with got goose bumps almost instantly.

However, even though a major breakthrough had been achieved with the title, bills were piling up, and his spouse got more nervous with each passing day. The title was there but the book was not selling. How could they continue to promote the book to publishers when real life was intruding so heavily

Hansen received over 33 rejection letters even though he was not an unknown in his field. In the following weeks, he was turned down by 134 more publishers. Finally, a small printing company agreed to take on the project if the authors agreed to buy the first 20,000 copies!

Well, what are you going to do if this is your dream You just keep the faith and keep on doing it. Hansen and Canfield agreed to buy the first 20,000 copies themselves, and the book hit the market in 1994. It did not make it to the first bestseller list until 14 month later. During all that time, the two men ceaselessly promoted the book by their own efforts.

Guess What Happened Next
The book became the greatest top-selling success story in the history of nonfiction books with over 100 million books in print and over a billion dollars in combined sales!

being resilient
and having persistence
- A tad bit of luck (being prepared, knowing when opportunity knocks and to act on it) is also a common thread
- when these great men are looked at.
also it's who knows you, not just who you know
Gates Mom was somehow connected, via her network, to the heavy hitter at IBM that started the roll for him.......good networking

This topic reminds me of Thomas Edison's famous quote:
"I have not failed. I've just found 10000 ways that won't work."