Last Updated on February 28, 2023 by the thought method co.
- Most people were taught that failure means they need to give up
- Failure is a actually part of success
- If you want to be successful, you need to be comfortable with failure
Below are 50 quotes about failure to help you reframe how you think about failure. Plus a bonus quote from Brené Brown to keep at your whip anytime someone tries to question your new mindset.
Failure to Success Quotes
1. “Failing is one of the greatest arts in the world. One fails toward success.”
Charles Kettering
2. “It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.”
Bill Gates
3. “The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won’t. It’s whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.”
Barack Obama
4. “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games 26 times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot … and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. That is why I succeed.”
Michael Jordan
5. “Failure is so important. We speak about success all the time. It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success. I’ve met people who don’t want to try for fear of failing.”
J. K. Rowling
6. “Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.”
Richard Branson
7. “My great concern is not whether you have failed, but whether you are content with your failure.”
Abraham Lincoln
8. “We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes–understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success.”
Arianna Huffington
9. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts.”
Winston Churchill
10. “The biggest risk is not taking any risk. In a world that changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.”
Mark Zuckerberg
11. “No human ever became interesting by not failing. The more you fail and recover and improve, the better you are as a person. Ever meet someone who’s always had everything work out for them with zero struggle? They usually have the depth of a puddle. Or they don’t exist.”
Chris Hardwick
12. “Part of being a man is learning to take responsibility for your successes and for your failures. You can’t go blaming others or being jealous. Seeing somebody else’s success as your failure is a cancerous way to live.”
Kevin Bacon
13. “Our greatest glory is not in never falling but in rising every time we fall.“
Confucius
14. “I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.”
Michael Jordan
15. “Every great cause is born from repeated failures and from imperfect achievements.”
Maria Montessori
16. “Do not fear mistakes. You will know failure. Continue to reach out.”
Benjamin Franklin
17. “There is something to be said for keeping at a thing, isn’t there?”
Frank Sinatra
18. “Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortune; but great minds rise above them.”
Washington Irving
19. “You have to be able to accept failure to get better.”
LeBron James
20. We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success.”
Samuel Smiles
21. “No matter how hard you work for success, if your thought is saturated with the fear of failure, it will kill your efforts, neutralize your endeavors and make success impossible.”
Baudjuin
22. “A man of genius makes no mistakes. His errors are volitional and are the portals of discovery.”
James Joyce
23. “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
Thomas Edison
24. “Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself.”
Charlie Chaplin
25. “Winners are not afraid of losing. But losers are. Failure is part of the process of success. People who avoid failure also avoid success.”
Robert T. Kiyosaki
26. “Only those who dare to fail greatly can achieve greatly.”
Robert F. Kennedy
27. “Life knocks a man down and he gets up and it knocks him down again … What’s he to do when he gets knocked down? Why, take it for his share and go on.”
Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
28. “You’ll always miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take.”
Wayne Gretzky
29. “A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent in doing nothing.”
George Bernard Shaw
30. “If you’re not prepared to be wrong, you’ll never come up with anything original.”
Ken Robinson
31. “Failure provides the opportunity to begin again, more intelligently.”
Henry Ford
32. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 1,000 ways that won’t work.”
Thomas Edison
33. “I don’t believe I have special talents, I have persistence … After the first failure, second failure, third failure, I kept trying.”
Carlo Rubbia
34. “An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he’s in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.”
Charles F. Kettering
35. “Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead-end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.”
Denis Waitley
36. “The fastest way to succeed is to double your failure rate.”
Thomas Watson Sr.
37. “I thank God for my failures. Maybe not at the time, but after some reflection. I never feel like a failure just because something I tried has failed.”
Dolly Parton
38. “Pain is temporary. Quitting lasts forever.”
Lance Armstrong
39. “Great success is built on failure, frustration, even catastrophe.
Sumner Redstone
40. “I never learned a thing from a tournament I won.”
Bobby Jones
41.” Flops are a part of life’s menu and I’ve never been a girl to miss out on any of the courses.”
Rosalind Russell
42. “It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.”
Herman Melville
43. “I failed my way to success.“
Thomas Edison
44. “Our achievements speak for themselves. What we have to keep track of are our failures, discouragements, and doubts. We tend to forget the past difficulties, the many false starts, and the painful groping. We see our past achievements as the end result of a clean forward thrust, and our present difficulties as signs of decline and decay.” Eric Hoffer
Eric Hoffer
45. “A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks that other throw at him.”
David Brinkley
46. “Fall seven times and stand up eight.”
Japanese Proverb
47. “I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure–It is: Try to please everybody.”
Herbert Bayard Swope
48. Success is walking from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.”
Winston Churchill
49. “If you really look closely, most overnight successes took a long time.”
Steve Jobs
50. “Don’t let the fear of losing be greater than the excitement of winning.”
Robert Kiyosaki
Bonus Quote
Not only a fear or failure, others can also keep us from trying to succeed. They could unintentionally project their fears onto us. Or, on a certain level, our success reminds them of their own failure. They could regret not trying and they need us to fail so they don’t feel bad. Remember, misery LOVES company.
Whatever the case, it can be tough out there. Below is a quote that I absolutely LOVE. Remind yourself of this quote anytime you get criticism when trying something new or after a failure, I do!
“If you are not in the arena getting your ass kicked on occasion, I am not interested in or open to your feedback. There are a million cheap seats in the world today filled with people who will never be brave with their own lives, but will spend every ounce of energy they have hurling advice and judgement at those of us trying to dare greatly. Their only contributions are criticism, cynicism, and fear-mongering. If you’re criticizing from a place where you’re not also putting yourself on the line, I’m not interested in your feedback.”
Brené Brown
Photo Credit: Photo by the blowup
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