What do Success, Persistence and Perseverance Have in Common?

One of the greatest determining factors of success is persistence or perseverance.

Many people quit too close to reaching their goals because they lose heart, stop believing, and give up.

The person who has her heart set on a vision and won’t give up until she achieves it will almost always be successful. The person who quits is by definition not successful.

Singers and musicians are often said to be an “overnight success”. People envy them because they seem to have gone from nothing to being hugely successful. But if we looked at the performers’ past, we would find years and years of grinding it out, practicing, playing for unappreciative audiences, and not giving up their dream.

Perseverance Has Its Rewards

I grew up in Nova Scotia, in eastern Canada. It seemed like when I went to a special event, the same girl was always singing. She often was unappreciated by her audience since whe wasn’t the headliner, but that never seemed to phase her. She just kept on singing and performing.

Today that girl, Anne Murray, is a hugely successful international singer. To me she exemplifies how perseverance is rewarded by success. She has been a great inspiration to me because she set such a great example of what a person could achieve through perseverance.

That is not to say that perseverance is always appropriate. Sometimes we have to look at the results of our intermediate steps and ask ourselves if we are going in the right direction. A lack of success can be an indication that we’re going down the wrong road.

Is Persistence Ever Wrong?

An example might be baseball players who focus solely on becoming professionals and then end up wasting many good years in dead-end attempts to get to the big time. There’s a big difference between quitting and changing your goals along the way.

We must also balance what we’re chasing with the cost of achieving it. As a youth I dreamed of being a politician and making a social contribution. However, I worked for a man who was a politician and saw the price he paid in his family life. After carefully assessing the pros and cons, I decided not to pursue that dream. The price was just too high for me.

As it turned out, my choice allowed me to get into the absolutely right career, as a professor teaching accounting and computers.

This is an excerpt from Bruce’s book “Attitude Determines Destiny”. 

As a motivational speaker, he conducts seminars and workshops based upon the ideas in his book. He entertains and inspires audiences wherever he goes.

Contact him for your next event