There are a few things that everyone can say that they experienced in their life. One thing that is promised is death, success at something, and the one that hurts everyone, taxes. With a every life, there comes struggle and happiness. No one knows how happy they would be unless they have failed at something. But failure does take its toll on some people. Only the strongest of people can overcome failure time-after-time in life. What kind of failures have you overcome to make you the person that you are today?

Think about the successful and wealthy people in the history of the world, and understand that somewhere in their life they overcame adversity and failure. There are people that you would never think could fail at something that they do great, and they have failed. Famous mathematician Albert Einstein failed math once as a teen. He didn’t let that stop him and turned one of his weaknesses into a strength and helped shape the math that is being used across the world today (e=mc2). We all know of the greatest basketball player ever, Michael Jordan. What most people do not know about Jordan is that he was cut from his high school basketball team his junior year. Jordan just took everything that the coaches thought he should improve, and worked on his game to improve those weak areas so next year he could be ready. Bill Gates, the richest man in the world, had to deal with not being able to complete college and dropping out. Gates only kept moving forward in his life and eventually helped initialize an electronic revolution throughout the world. Can you see that failure can be used to make you a much better person to yourself and to the world? Each of the mentioned people took what they were good at, made it better and improved the areas they were weak in. They didn’t let their past failures prohibit them from moving forward and looking to become greater.

Everyone attempts to do something new and with an attempt the outcome is either a success or a failure. Whether it is a hobby or more importantly a job, sometimes it does not work out in your favor. Your friends are your biggest influence on you when trying new things. You may try new things just because your friends are doing it, but that never means that you will be as successful as them or you will be equally or better than they are at it. Friends often attempt new sports together as a way to have fun. When your friend makes and you do not, vice versa, and if both of you do not make it, you will have to improve what you do. People do not realize the importance of improving their weaknesses when they fail, or even when they succeed. The more you develop you skills, the more comfortable you will be with working hard to reach your goal as a team. Then, when it comes around for you to try out again, you will be ready and things will be easy for you to make the team or whatever it is. Teenagers may apply for a summer job, but they may not get the job the first time, or first few times, they apply for the job. But what you shouldn’t do is let this get to you and keep you from applying again because you felt that you were not good enough. You can prove people wrong and show them that you are good enough for the job, and then do better than the person they originally hired in order to show them how big of a mistake that was. To some, the first time they failed will prevent them from trying again and finding out whether or not they had what it takes to make it the second time. But they have let failure defeat them and will not do better since they are not trying.

Failure is something that will only hold you back if you let it. Some people fail, take it as a learning experience and better themselves. Others fail and see it as a sign to give up. Successful people would not be so successful without the many others who have failed attempting to do what they do best. If Bill Gates had given up and thought he was a failure, after he dropped out of college, would the computer and gaming industry be as strong as it is today? Would basketball be as big a sport, without the electrifying skills of Michael Jordan? Failure should be a wakeup call to improve instead of give up.Failure should be an incentive to prove the world wrong, and prove that you should have gotten it done the first time. To me failure is just one more step towards success and another failure should be one more reason to show people what you can really do and how much potential you have.