Here’s one of my favorite quotes on perseverance:
“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” — Michael Jordan
People sometimes get tired of hearing me say it, but I believe that if you’re knocked down ten times, you’ve got to be damn sure you get up eleven times. It’s those who don’t persevere through the darkest times who never get to see the brightest lights.
Of course we all have tough periods in our lives. There were definitely plenty of dark days for me and this agency, days when we faced setbacks and lost clients. But we always found a way to learn from the experience and become stronger, and we always bounced back.
Perseverance is a way of looking at the world. Keeping a positive mental attitude, and preaching that attitude both internally and externally, even during the toughest times, is what allowed our agency to post four great years — ’08, ’09, ’10, and 11 — when everyone else was panicking about a recession.
Sometimes it seems like everyone around you wants you to think about what you CAN’T do. Those “No” voices could belong to your friends, your spouse, your girlfriend, your boyfriend — anybody, even someone who’s very close to you and wants the best for you. These people sit around all day and talk about what you CAN’T do. Your job is not to listen to those “No” voices, not to let them create your belief system, not to buy into that word CAN’T.
Never let other people take away the belief that you CAN keep going, even if you do miss a shot. How many people sit around all day talking about the stuff you CAN do? Nobody, unless it’s you. At the end of the day, there’s only person who can tell you what you CAN do: you. That’s the voice you want to listen to first.
