Failing is good

“I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.“

Michael Jordan

A biology teacher was teaching his students how a caterpillar turns into a butterfly. He told the students that in the next couple of hours, the butterfly would struggle to come out of the cocoon. But no one should help the butterfly. Then he left.

The students were waiting and it happened. The butterfly struggled to get out of the cocoon, and one of the students took pity on it and decided to help the butterfly out of the cocoon against the advice of his teacher. He broke the cocoon to help the butterfly so it didn’t have to struggle anymore. But shortly afterwards the butterfly died.

When the teacher returned, he was told what happened. He explained to this student that by helping the butterfly, he had actually killed it because it is a law of nature that the struggle to come out of the cocoon actually helps develop and strengthen its wings. The boy had deprived the butterfly of its struggle and the butterfly died.

 Apply this same principle to our lives. Nothing worthwhile in life comes without a struggle. As parents we tend to hurt the ones we love most because we don’t allow them to struggle to gain strength

 I have shared  few more personal experiences  of Failures in life to explain my concept.

 I run a  company which helps student prepare for one of the most Prestigious IT Certification called CCIE ( Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert)  .Remember i just used the word most prestigious which is directly proportional to quite complex .Everything that Prestigious is complex to achieve and if everybody can achieve it then it cannot be prestigious .I meet a lot of my students on daily basis who failed and came to meet me to ask for improvement plan .When I ask them their score ,they are always very close almost failed by 1% or 2 % marks .I have not seen a student who failed every by a gap of 30% marks .Despite of failing ,we have the best passing rate in CCIE Exams in first and second attempt ,our first attempt passing rate is around 40% while second attempt passing rate is about 89% .Means anybody who has failed in first attempt is almost sure to pass in next if he failed with small gap .I ask them the reason of failures and they generally have a clear idea of where they failed .I feel happy to know my students have a clarity on each section and reason of failure .When this happens ,they prepare with great enthusiasm .Each student prepares his strategy to beat complex section and this leads to them attaining the most prestigious certifications .We have been a leader in  passing results and no one in the world is close .Only last year we have produced close to 250 Total CCIE while nearest competitor in USA  has not produced over 50 CCIEs .Our training infrastructure is one of the Largest in the World and we did not believe this till the time external Trainers confirmed this to us as they have worked for most of big players in India and USA .

 On placement side ,I take care of personality development to interview preparation and results have been tremendous again .But this did not happen overnight ,5 years of hardwork and learning from failures have resulted in creating one of the best Training company in India .We have never repeated a failure or  mistake again and that made all the difference .

 What do you do when you are travelling somewhere on your bike or car and it gets punctured on the way .Do you leave the bike on road and cancel your journey or you get it fixed and start again to reach to your destination .

 As we know MIT ,Harvard ,Stanford are very prestigious institutes in the World like IIM and IIT in India are the most prestigious educational institutes. Millions of students try for admission into these institutions however only few thousand are able to make it .Rest all fail .What happens to those who could not reach to IIT ,IIM or Harvard university , they get selected into Next Best College .I have a friend of mine who use to prepare for IIT Examination and was really passionate about getting into IIT .However even after trying 2 times ,he could not secure an admission into IIT however due to his preparation for IIT level exam he was selected in REC Delhi(Another World Class Institute) .Do you count it  a less achievement in any sense  ? I have many other friends who never prepared for anything big and ended up in small local colleges in their local city .They never tried for anything big so never got even half of it .

I would like to share some of the biggest inspirations for me which I have followed to deal with failures and they have lead me toward great Personal and Professional Success in Life .

 Larry Page and Sergey Bin -Google

No need of introduction. In 1998 Google sets up workspace in Susan Wojcicki’s garage at 232 , Santa Margarita, Men-lo park and Larry and Sergey hire Craig Silverstein as their first employee. Rest is history. They too failed first. They approached Yahoo in their earlier years for selling the idea. But the reply was NO. Then what happened. Now Google is bigger than Yahoo.

Nowadays people tend to give more focus on failures. They easily come to the conclusion that they are not capable of doing it. Any one who believes he can do it, can do it hundreds of times if he try it for 99 times. There is no short cut to success. Success can be achieved only by hard work and practice. Without these thing success will always elude you. All success people have short comings. All failed people too have short comings. The difference is that success people try hard to impair their shortcomings but failed one repent and live and die along with their shortcomings.

Steve Jobs -Apple

Steve Jobs need no introduction to anybody in the world. But you know he had slept in the floor of friends’s door rooms. He returned coke bottles for money. Steve jobs while in India, regularly got weekly free meals from local temple. A below par student as per the teachers of his school. But how he made Billions. Sheer hard work and confidence in his abilities. Perseverance and sticking to his strengths and proving that he means business. Rest is history.

Warren Buffet

As a young boy, he delivered newspapers and filed his first tax return at age 13 – and he claimed $35 deduction for the bicycle he bought. Now he is the second richest person in the world.

The theme behind all the stories are that these leaders dream big. Really big.

Dhirubhai Ambani

Dhirubhai Ambani started his entrepreneurial career by selling “bhajias” to pilgrims in Mount Girnar over the weekends during his early days. After doing his matriculation at the age of 16, Dhirubhai moved to Aden, Yemen. He worked there as a gas-station attendant, and as a dispatch clerk with A.Besse & Co. After becoming the distributor for the Shell products,A.Besse & Co promoted Dhirubhai to manage the company`s oil filling station at the port of Aden. But he returned to India in 1958 with Rs 50,000 and started the Reliance Commercial Corporation with a capital of Rs 15,000. From modest Rs.50,000 his empire now worth around 7 lakhs crores. What more he does not attend the school. If one have the patience and self confidence and dedication for the aim in his life, one can taste success. Success will always follow the hard work. Clouds cannot always keep the sun in darkness.

 Thomas Alva Edision

 Once a student named Tomy returned home from school crying loud. On seeing this his mother asked him what had happened. He show her a letter from his class teacher. His class teacher complained that Tomy is not clever, brilliant and smart enough to continue in the school. He is a laggard and the teacher wants the Tomy’s mother to transfer Tomy from the school. This Tomy later become the great scientist THOMA ALVA EDISON. Thomas Alva Edison had only 3 month education in the school. Thomas Elva Edison failed around 10000times in the discovery of Electric bulb.