How To Make Money By Failing

To be a successful entrepreneur, you are first going to have to learn to deal with failure. The path to the goal is seldom straight when trying to figure out how to make money. There is no way around it. If you do not believe me, please allow me to provide you with some examples below.

 

Exhibit A: We all know that Thomas Edison invented the light bulb. However, what many of us do not know, is that he tried nearly ten-thousand different experiments before he finally demonstrated the first incandescent light bulb on October 21st, 1879.

 

Exhibit B: We all know that Bill Gates founded Microsoft. What most of us do not know is that Bill Gates' first company, Traf-O-Data, was an absolute failure.

 

Exhibit C: Michael Jordan was once quoted as saying: "I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions, I have been trusted to take the game winning shot, and I have missed. In fact, I have failed over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed."

 

Exhibit D: Danny DeVito went on over one-hundred auditions before auditioning successfully. He did not give up, and is still working to this day on a television show whose creator was an unsuccessful aspiring actor (Rob McElhenney) for seven years, prior to FX casting his television show, "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia."

 

Most entrepreneurs on a quest of how to make money often fail prior to achieving success. Of course you usually do not hear about the failures because people become known for being successful. Have you ever hear the saying, "If it were easy, then everybody would be doing it?" Nothing reign more true to the plight of the entrepreneur.

 

 

Going back to "Exhibit A", Thomas Edison was asked whether it was frustrating failing nearly ten-thousand times prior to inventing the light bulb. Edison's response was, "I did not fail nearly ten-thousand times, rather, I merely came up with around ten-thousand methods that did not work." Essentially what Edison was saying was that failure for an entrepreneur is not a failure in the usual sense of the word. By failing, Edison was able to eliminate methods which he knew would not work, and focus on new methods. Ultimately, he invented the first incandescent light bulb by finding his newest method on October 21st, 1879.

 

As entrepreneurs trying to figure out how to make money, we need to understand that we will run into methods which simply will not work. When we come across of method which does not work, we can learn from it and eliminate it, just as Thomas Edison did.

 

Just think of what would have happened had Edison given up after his first 500, 1000, or even 9000 methods which did not work. It probably would have set the invention of the light bulb back by decades.

 

 

In my opinion, the most important aspect of how to make money, is how you deal with failure. Once you accept failure as an inevitability, you are able to learn from your mistakes and build from there. It is really easy to let the failure consume you, and knock you off of your path. This is not because you are a pessimistic being, it has more to do with the fact that it is truly difficult to see something which you poured your heart and soul into be ignored or rejected.

 

You need to come to the realization that your business is what the public is ignoring or rejecting, NOT you. The sooner you can recognize and realize this, the sooner you can objectively analyze why you failed, and learn which things are necessary for improvement in the future.

 

Failure very difficult, and is extremely frustrating, however, it is a neighbor of success.