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| Mouth-Offs | ADD and Mind
ControlIf my goal is to jump 10 feet high and I jump 5 feet, I haven’t failed because I haven’t stopped trying yet. If on the other hand, I gave up, then I could say that I failed. Since quitting is a decision made by the individual striving toward a goal, one can only fail if they consciously decide to quit. Thus, failure doesn’t "happen", it is chosen.
If I had been working very hard day after day to jump 10 feet high, but for the last two years have only been able to jump 5 feet high with little progress, many people would begin to tell me that I have failed at my goal. But instead of quitting, I could look at my efforts over the past few years, analyze my experiences, and alter my goal to something more achievable. For example my new goal could be to jump 5 feet high and clap my feet while in the air. Instead of viewing this change as failure, I look at the past as a great learning experience that helped me formulate a new improved focus.
Regardless of what I think, people will tell me that I am a failure. But people who consider themselves or other people failures simply have a negative view of the world. Since having a negative attitude is unproductive, people who see failure are more likely to gravitate to failure themselves. So if you consider yourself or someone you know a failure, just change your mind, and if you are worried that other people think you are a failure, don’t worry about it because their negative attitude will make them less successful than you.
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