Failure is something most individuals will avoid at all costs – many times an action is not even attempted due to a fear or thought around the perceived lack of success of that action. Yet if we stop and think more on the subject, we all understand failing is a part of success. Let me provide a couple of examples - how many times does a baby fall down before they learn to walk, and later run? The Olympic marksmen of today didn’t always hit the bulls-eye when they started learning to shoot many years ago – did they?

The baby in my first example does not know that "falling down" is a "failure to walk". No, they may laugh and giggle with an "oops", or perhaps cry if they fell down hard, but they get back up to their standing position and try it again. They already have had success moving from the crawling stage and now are working on the ability to navigate on two feet. As we grow in years, we understand that it hurts when we fall off our bicycle, if we don’t study enough or don’t understand an assignment in school we may fail the test, or even the grade. By the time we reach adulthood, we have learned and been told failure is something to be avoided. In many cases, we then stop trying because we believe we won’t get it right the first time.

Let’s take the salesman who from past experience knows for about every 10 presentations, he can expect one sale. We don’t know whether it will be the first individual he talks to who makes the buying decision, or the tenth one. Sometimes it might be 18 consecutive no’s before the next 2 sales are made. But we can agree, the one in ten ratio holds true over time.

Our salesman determines he wants to more successful in his effort – he is aggressive and wishes to increase his income by 50% next year. So how can he do that? If he changes nothing in his presentation and does everything he is currently doing, instead of making 10 presentations a week, he now will meet with 15 individuals each week. As the averages from the past hold out, he now is making 3 sales every two weeks. He has succeeded in his plan to raise his income by 50%. But in order to do that, he needed to increase his failure rate by 50% as well.

Most people will visualize "success" being one direction, with "failure" as the complete opposite direction. With that kind of thinking, after a number of failures we think we are headed in the wrong direction and either completely stop (and quit), or turn around and head in the other direction soon to find that doesn’t work either.

"Failing" and "being a failure" are two separate and different things. Failing could be as simple as hearing "no", or falling on your bottom as you learn to walk. Being a failure is someone who is rejected a few times or gives up riding the bicycle after one scratched knee. Until we quit, we have not failed – we just haven’t succeeded.

Having the courage to keep going when all we receive is "no" is not taking action in the absence of the fear of rejection. Quite the opposite – courage is acting in the face of fear and rejection. If we persevere and continue time and time again, the fear will be reduced, diminished, or perhaps even go away. When we numb ourselves sufficiently to failure and rejection, that act will no longer have any power over us.

People are remembered for their successes, not their failures. We know Babe Ruth as a home run king, not for the 1330 strike-outs in his career. Too often we simply stop too soon as our success may come with the next attempt. Have the courage to act in the face of fear, and "fail forward to your success". Increasing your failures will lead to greater success.