An Award Winning Failure
Until today, I don’t think I ever really understood or
appreciated the word “Relentless”. Described by Wiktionary as
- Unrelenting or unyielding in severity
- Unremitting, steady and persistent
The first time, I heard this word many, many times is the
day I met Wayne Alyn Root, former USA vice president nominee and best selling
author. This old man has more energy than anyone I’ve ever met. I sat there and
wondered…what drives this man? Is it fame, fortune or the need to show the
world he truly has something different to offer? I sat there in complete
amazement. Just being in his company, I could feel his positive energy and
vibe. Totally amazed.
In my own experience, being “Relentless” means “to never
stop”, “don’t give up”. Since I left my
corporate job, in the space of 1.5 years, I started 3 businesses and faced many
great challenges, I realised that sometimes you need to be relentless if you
firmly believe in what you’re doing and you’re passionate about it; and
sometimes you need to know when to put a stop to it. The first two ventures I
tried didn’t pan out for different reasons. The first one as an example, was
because I got caught up in an industry I truly wasn’t even passionate about and
just went at it for the money. The second one was due to bad partnership
relationships, which was pretty much like being in a bad marriage. The last one which I still own, also didn’t
work out as planned, but I realised that if I wanted it to really work I needed
to make some major adjustments. When you know deep down it’s one of your
passions, and you just cannot let go so easily then it’s worth fighting for.
I’ve heard of people starting ventures as much as 10 or 20
and they all failed, but then there was always one or at least a few of those
business ideas which ended up being a mind blowing success. In the past few
months I put so much pressure on myself and criticised myself to the endth
degree because I thought it was due to a lack of performance and eventually
felt like an award winning failure.
What makes all the successful people never give up? I ask
myself this question over and over again, because blady hell, It’s-hard! Being
‘relentless’ in my view needs to add a side note of ‘slightly insane!’ next to
it cause that’s pretty much what you need to be in order to never give up.
That, and a real hunger for survival, passion and success.
That said, I believe we should also know when to end
something that’s no good for us or bringing us down. Looking back, if there’s
one thing I’ve learnt is that you need to know when what you started isn’t good
for you or whether you need to review things and make some adjustments in order
for it to work. Simple words which could have saved me so much time, had I
known at the time, however had I not experienced it, I don’t think it would
have meant much to me and I definitely would not have share it with you today.
