PERSISTENCE

Persistence and determination guarantee success because they represent the will to continue until the goal is reached. Persistence, which moves us forward, mustn't be confused with stubbornness or rigidness, which holds us back. For persistence is about what we WILL do and stubbornness about what we WON'T do.

The difference between success and failure has less to do with know-how than it does with know-when-to-quit, which is never. For as Confucius taught, "It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not stop." Although those who fail attribute the success of others to 'good luck,' they don't realize that 'good fortune' is nothing more than determination to overcome misfortune.

Part of life deals with overcoming obstacles, and we do so with the tools of persistence and determination. Imagine what the world would have lost had Abraham Lincoln, Helen Keller, and Thomas Edison given up when faced with their 'insurmountable' problems. Imagine what you will lose if you choose to give up when faced with life's challenges.

Here's what American billionaire and co-founder of Amway, Richard M. DeVos, has to say about the value of persistence, "If I had to select one quality, one personal characteristic that I regard as being most highly correlated with success, whatever the field, I would pick the trait of persistence. Determination. The will to endure to the end, to get knocked down seventy times and get up off the floor saying, 'Here comes number seventy-one!'"