Your Real Success

"Real success depends on how successfully you handle your failures. Getting up means that each problem, each failure, is an invitation to learn something you did not know before.  The more you learn from mistakes, the wiser you become. The wiser you become, the fewer mistakes you will repeat. And how do you really learn? By experience, and that means not being afraid to make mistakes—as long as you learn from them.  Success is not how little you fall. It is how fast you get up."

-- Ichak K. Adizes

No One Make No Mistake

"I, for one, have never heard of a person who overcame all problems without ever making a mistake. To me, even God admits to making a mistake by bringing on the flood; God admits to being powerless to make us all righteous, thus the flood was the wrong decision and God makes a covenant to never repeat that mistake again. God also admits of being forgetful. He brings the rainbow to remind him to stop the rain (Genesis 6:9–9:19). God appears to me so human. So, who is this human who is better than God and never makes a mistake? We consider mistakes failures because we assume we should not have made a mistake."

-- Ichak K. Adizes

Ask Yourself This Question

"When my kids were young, putting them to sleep instead of reading them a book, sometimes I would ask them, “What did you learn today?” When you finish a book, ask yourself that question. There are no failures in life: you either succeed or you learn."

-- Ichak K. Adizes

Endless Opportunity To Learn

"No one lives forever, but who knows when any of us will part company with this world? You might live a long life, so why not keep learning and improving who you are? The more you know, the more you know how much you do not know. There is endless opportunity to learn."

-- Ichak K. Adizes

Stop Growing and You Start Dying

"To improve yourself: to learn, to grow. Otherwise, you’ll be aging mentally. Keep your mind active, keep your spirit active, and you will prolong your life. It doesn’t have to be every week or every day. You can say, “Every three months I’m going to take a course, learn something new.” Or, “I’m going to read a book every evening.” That keeps you growing because when you stop growing, you start dying. Your last priority should be to work to build your assets."

-- Ichak K. Adizes

Just Do Your Best

"That is what you should do. And do the best you can. Without wanting, without expecting.  Just DO the best you can and if it doesn’t work, look for the reason and learn how to do better next time. Life is teaching you, like falling off a bicycle. What did you learn? How to ride it better next time.  Remember: people who love what they are doing are more productive, more innovative, and more pleasant to live and to work with. And they love themselves, too."

-- Ichak K. Adizes

At Your Last Breath

"If you follow your inner light, your purpose, when you are breathing your last breath and somebody asks you whether you feel any remorse or sorrow that you wasted your life, you should be able to say, “No, I lived my life to the fullest; I lived the life I was destined to live.”"

-- Ichak K. Adizes

When You Cannot Forgive

"Those who cannot forgive, those who hold on to guilt or blame themselves or others, end up spending a great deal of unnecessary and negative energy that “eats them up” and makes them sick. The worst energy sucker is hate. It ages us prematurely."

-- Ichak K. Adizes