 Sometime around the year 2007, I came across a book titled Failing Ford. This book was written by John C. Maxwell and it contains several stories of individuals who are the most successful people in the world. Reading this book, I discovered something most people don't understand about life and success, which is the most successful people in the world, are the ones who are failed most. While an average person on the street believes that people who succeed simply had some luck, the truth is that failures, massive failures, are almost always the road that leads to success. And why is that so? Robert Greene said, Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. Repeated failures make people tough and strong because these people who embrace failures become stronger and tougher. They become more successful than others. It's that simple. When you try new things and make mistakes, you'll become stronger. When you attempt something big and fail, you'll become smarter. When you dare life and fall, you'll become tougher because failures and mistakes teach us incredible lessons we can never learn any other way. People who attempt more things, even though they get more failures, also achieve what other people cannot achieve. Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. Roland Hussay Macy Sr. was born on August 30, 1822. At the age of 15, Macy worked on the whaling ship Emily Morgan and had a red star tattooed on either his hand or his forearm. R.H. Macy and his brother Charles started a dry goods store in Merrisville, California, shortly after the city was founded at the height of the Gold Rush in 1850. Unfortunately, the store failed. Charles stayed in Merrisville after the store failed, but Roland headed east. Between 1843 and 1855, Macy opened four retail dry goods stores, including the original Macy's store in downtown Haberville, Massachusetts, established in 1851 to serve the mill industry employees of the area. All of these four stores failed, but he learned from his mistakes. Macy moved to New York City in 1858 and established a new store named R.H. Macy Dry Goods at 6th Avenue on the corner of 14th Street, significantly north of other dry goods stores of the time. On the company's first day of business in October 28, 1858, sales totaled $11.08, equal to $326.82 today. As the business grew, Macy dry goods expanded into neighboring buildings, opening up more and more departments and used publicity devices such as a store Santa Claus, themed exhibits and illuminated window displays to draw in customers. It offered a money-back guarantee, although it only accepted cash into the 1950s. The store also produced its made-to-measure clothing for both men and women, assembled in an on-site factory. After seven painful failures, R.H. Macy eventually succeeded in building a business. What if he had never tried? What if he had given up after three failures? Repeated failures will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. People who succeed in life are the tough-minded ones. Success requires that you are strong and tough and that's why failure is inevitable, because nothing in human experience makes as strong as failures. Nothing can make you tough as failures and that's why running away from mistakes and failure is the surest way to achieve nothing in life. Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. Robert Green was born on May 14, 1959. As a young boy, Robert had always known that he wanted to be a writer but he didn't know what to write about. He tried novels, essays and plays. Right after university, he gave journalism a try. But one day, his boss told him that he was a poor writer so he stopped pursuing a career in journalism. That started his wandering in life. Robert traveled across Europe. He did all the odd jobs he can get his hands on. Construction work in Greece, teaching English in Barcelona, hotel receptionist in Paris and a tour guide in Dublin. Robert Green wrote several novels that were never finished and dozens of essays that were thrown in the trash and plays that never got a green light. At age 36, Robert Green had done 50 odd jobs, all making his life seem useless. But he was becoming stronger and tougher with age failure until when he met Juist Elfers, a Packager and Book Producer in Italy. They were walking along the quays of Venice when Juist axed him for an idea. The idea of power came rushing into him at that moment when Juist axed him. As if all those years of wandering, reading and writing culminated in that one moment, Robert discussed the power dynamics that he's seen in his jobs, the same thing happening in the history books he's reading. He wanted to explore those ideas and tie them all together. That was the birth of his most famous work, The 48 Laws of Power. Today, Robert Green is considered one of the most successful writers in the world. But guess what? The only thing that made him a success is failure, multiple failures. If Robert had not been through 50 odd jobs, several rejections and painful failures as he tried to become a writer, he wouldn't have ever had the raw material needed to write 48 laws of power. Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. Listen to me, young people. The worst thing you can do for your destiny is to play it safe in life. I know you want to be successful. I know you want to own a business. Get all the money you need and have a great life. But I also know that none of these things you desire will come to you as easily as you want them. They are all on the other side of failures. So you will do well with your life to try, dare and attempt new things. And when you make mistakes or fail in your journey of life, don't look for who to blame. Don't point the finger or expect a messiah from any of the politicians ruling your country. Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. In the part of the world where I live, which is Nigeria, so many people believe that because they go to church, they shouldn't have problems in life. To make matters worse, these people have been deceived by many fake preachers who tell them that the children of God ought not to fail in life. The result of this deception is that when people in my country start a business and fail, they automatically believe it's the work of the devil. Most times when these people fail two or three times, they stop trying altogether because they believe they ought not to fail. While I would love to live in a world where I could achieve my dreams without any headaches, after studying the lives and biographies of hundreds of people who have become successful in life, one thing I see that unites these people is that they all fail. They fail a lot before they figure out how to succeed. Because I know this truth from history, I decided not to expect what I want out of life but to accept the reality of life. I know what you want. You want a good life and you want it easily. You wish you could get all you want as fast as you wanted with little effort. Unfortunately, you won't ever have success until you endure failures. Repeated failure will toughen your spirit and show you with absolute clarity how things must be done. Mistakes are painful, but they are not your enemy. Failures are bitter, but they are working for your good. Mistakes and failures make you stronger and tougher. The stronger and tougher you become, the closer you are to succeed. It's that simple. The surest way to fail in life is to run away from failures. The surest way to succeed is to embrace failures. I love you. My name is Steve Courage from Lagos, Nigeria.