The Single Greatest Secret to Success: Don’t Give Up!

We only fail when we stop trying. That’s why successful people learn to take knock-backs on the chin and don’t let it put them off achieving their goals.

One of America’s greatest inventors and businessmen, Thomas Edison made the point that “our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.”

It is a simple thought shared by almost every successful athlete and business person you care to name.

“You just can’t beat the person who never gives up”

As legendary baseball star, Babe Ruth’s famously said, “You just can’t beat the person who never gives up”
While not giving up makes a lot of practical sense in a sporting context, the mantra of not giving up is key for many business successes too.

Sales and business coach Dale Carnegie has written, “Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.”

A case in point being the anti-apartheid revolutionary and South African political leader Nelson Mandela who said, “It always seems impossible until it’s done.”

If any leader knows about achieving the seemingly impossible, it has to be Mandela – who has inspired millions around the world.

Nor is entrepreneur Richard Branson a big fan of giving up. He recently told Sky News that failing his exams and learning not to give up playing an important part in his subsequent success.

Indeed, Branson suggests that the knockbacks he received along the way actually contributed to his success.

In his book, Like a Virgin: Secrets They Won’t Teach You at Business School, Branson wrote:

“Had I pursued my education long enough to learn all the conventional dos and don’ts of starting a business I often wonder how different my life and career might have been.”

As Henry Ford reputedly said, “failure is only the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently”.