The other day I was watching a TV sitcom, where the guest, who was being interviewed ,was a successful police officer. However, he attempted to clear the civil services exams, multiple times and failed. Even though, he failed multiple times, he never gave up ,in his mind and continued to strive for his dream ,to come true.

Many of us have laudable dreams and we work towards that goal. We strive hard and toil our way through , to achieve our dream. However, when there are multiple obstacles on our way or we fail a few times, we tend to give up and never realise our goal.

However, one can learn a good lesson from the sports persons. Recently,I was inspired by a tennis great, who retired after being a world champion for many years. He narrated of how he failed more than he succeeded in all the games, he played in life. Every failure taught him valuable lessons and enabled him to become a world champion.

When we see a star in sports or even films, we do not know how much they may have struggled to reach that stardom. We see their star status and feel that is easy for them. Their struggles, trials and tribulations get hidden behind their success today. There are innumerable stories of sports persons, movie stars and other celebrities, who have struggled their way through and lived through their failures, to succeed in life.

I am reminded of even an ex President of India. He was from a humble poor family and did not have enough resources ,to have two meals a day and even educate himself. However, he had a dream and vision for India. He overcame all these obstacles and rose to head the highest defence research body in India and later became the President of India and has also been conferred the highest civilian award in India.

All these people teach us a simple lessons in life. They tell us, through their life journeys, that “Failure does not determine life’s trajectory”. They have failed more than they have succeeded ,in their respective field but yet they have reached the peak of their respective domains.

I have learnt a few simple lessons from these wonderful people, which I would like to share for all of us to learn and adopt in our lives :

A. We need to have a dream and vision of what we want to achieve in life

B. We need to work zealously to achieve that goal, come what may, on our way.

C. Every failure teaches us valuable lessons in life, if we are willing to accept them ,as our steps to success.

D. We should never give up during our journey, despite of all failures, as they teach us relevant lessons and pave the way for our success in life.

E. The most successful people in life ,fail more than than they succeed but never give up until they achieve their mission in life.

Let our journey continue till we reach our goal.

S Ramesh Shankar

5th January 2025