Failing and Quitting

I have recently read over a couple of books. Neither of them are spiritual in nature. In fact, one is a business book on leadership/management. But, they were fascinating and gave me some things to think about and “chew” on.

Failing Forward by John Maxwell

The Dip by Seth Godin

One book is about failing and the other book is about quitting. Sounds real uplifting doesn’t it.
The failure book was basically on the necessity to learn to handle failure in a way that it can be used to better your life instead of ruin it. The quitting book was more about when to persevere and when it is the right time to pull out of whatever it is you are doing.

The “dip” is basically the tough part of anything. It is when effort is at a maximum and results are at a minimum. The dip is the place most people quit, when they shouldn’t. The dip is the place you should work harder to fully realize the desired end result.
An example given is weight lifting. When you are doing a set of push ups, it is only the last few that produces the benefit in your muscles. The last few are also the ones that hurt the most, the ones that you don’t want to do, the ones where most people stop. That is the dip.




Think about some of these quotes.

From The Dip

“Only talented people fret about mediocrity.”

“The stupid thing to do is to start (something), give it your best shot, waste a lot of time and money, and quit right in the middle of the dip.”

“A woodpecker can tap twenty times on a thousand trees and get nowhere, but stay busy. Or he can tap twenty thousand times on one tree and get dinner.”


From Failing Forward

“We are all failures --- at least, all the best of us are. J.M Barrie”

“People think failure is avoidable—it’s not.”

“Failure isn’t so bad if it doesn’t attack the heart. Success is all right if it doesn’t go to the head. Grantland Rice.”

“God uses people who fail – because there aren’t any other kind around.”

“As Harvard psychologist Jerome Bruner says, ‘You’re more likely to act yourself into feeling than feel yourself into action.’ So act! Whatever it is you know you should do, do it.”

“Get over yourself—everyone else has.”

“Don’t let your learning lead to knowledge; let your learning lead to action. Jim Rohn.”

“There always comes a time when giving up is easier than standing up, when giving in looks more attractive than digging in. And in those moments, character may be the only thing you have to draw on to keep you going.”





I don’t necessarily have any brilliant spiritual insight from these things. I just wanted to give you some “food for thought”.