What you get when you don't win

The recipe for success? Failure.

Thomas Edison held 1,093 patents for different inventions.

By many measures, he was a failure.

In Bill Bryson’s book “At Home,” he notes that Edison’s ideas “mostly proved to be impractical or demonstrably harebrained” and that “nobody was better at inventing things that had no obvious need or purpose.”

Here are a few of Edison’s more cockamamie creations:

- Concrete houses, furnished with concrete chairs, beds and even pianos 
- Giant magnets for the army that would catch and send back enemy bullets
- Coin-operated stores that would send goods hurtling down a chute at customers

Oh, and Edison also invented the lightbulb.
And the motion picture camera.
And the phonograph.

And by 1920, his inventions were worth $21.6 billion.

So when asked about his career, Edison could afford some perspective.

“I have not failed 10,000 times,” he said. “I’ve successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.”

Learning through history is tricky.

There’s a concept called “survivorship bias.” More often than not, history is written by the winners — by those who survived.

We take advice from those who made it, but we rarely hear from those who failed. And it gives us an incomplete picture of reality.

In life (and especially in business) we hear a common phrase: “Bet on yourself.”

Why?

Because those who made it bet on themselves. And blessed with success, they can afford to tell you to do the same.

But what about those who didn’t make it?

What about those who bet on themselves and failed?

When you only listen to the survivors, you’re exposed to a skewed version of reality.

The truth?

- Studies show that 80% of small businesses fail in the first year.
- Roughly 91% of New Year’s resolutions crash and burn.
- Some relationships last for life. Most don’t.

So when it's time to make your own decision, should you trust the survivors?

Or should you trust the numbers?

Here’s my conclusion:

There’s one hard and fast rule about everyone who has “made it” and everyone who has failed.

Those who made it didn’t quit.
Those who failed did.
Full stop.

In his book “The Last Lecture,” the late Carnegie Mellon professor Randy Pausch recounted his life and shared wisdom with his children as he faced terminal pancreatic cancer.

In one passage, Pausch addresses the wonderful, life-changing, must-be-embraced power of failure:

“Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.”

Failure isn’t a loss.
It’s just a chance to get better.
And it can only stop you if you quit.

So bet on yourself. Believe the survivors.

And keep going.