Success Is Not Final, Failure Is Not Fatal

Success Is Not Final, Failure Is Not Fatal

What is failure? William Zinsser doesn’t believe that just because you drop out, doesn’t mean you just failed the toughest class you would ever take called life. Confucius once said, “Success depends upon previous preparation, and without such preparation there is sure to be failure.” Just like Zinsser Confucius also thought that one’s success doesn’t have to depend on working hard it could also depend on failing at something that doesn’t work. There’s rarely such a thing as failure usually it’s success at finding what doesn’t work.

William Zinsser was a writing professor at Yale University in the 1970. William Zinsser was also a writer, columnist, editor, and critic. William Zinsser thought that, one shouldn’t be afraid to fail, because sometimes one will find what one is really looking for in failing. College isn’t for everybody one should standup for oneself and do what one really love to do. It’s okay to dropout but it shouldn’t be a goal of yours. Sometimes one has to fail to succeed. One should also stay true to who one’s self to succeed. “For the young, dropping out is often a way of dropping in.” William Zinsser stated in ‘The Right To Fail’ as an over all conclusion to what a dropout is defined as. Consequently, success is simply a matter of luck confined in anybody that has once failed then succeeded.

“I only mean that failure isn’t bad in itself, or success automatically good.” Zinsser stated in passage about failing. Success should not be measured by what one has done, but what you can change in yourself, others, and failures. Success could be found in Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs was fired from apple in the late 1980 s, and later created other graphic design companies. He also dropped out of college, and continued on to fulfill his dreams. There is a middle in between failing and succeeding. That middle is where you look back at what you failed at doing, and transform that failure into success. Furthermore, just because one has a higher degree of education doesn’t mean they will succeed at what they are trying to succeed at.

“Obviously the colleges don’t have more than a partial answer-otherwise the young would not be so disaffected with an education that they consider vapid.” Zinsser writes (237). For example, not getting accepted into the college of one’s dreams. College doesn’t need to define who you are you need to define who you are. College is only a partial answer to what one is trying to discover. You are the only person who can define you, college is not the definition of you just a partial definition. One’s failures don’t define oneself, and ones success’s doesn’t define oneself. Once one defines who one is, one will come out a stronger person. In addition, I’d rather be a failure at something I love then a success at something I hate.

Success is often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable. Once you find what you love to do the world will come to you. “Writers, playwrights, painters, and composers work in the expectation of periodic defeat, but they wouldn’t keep going back into the arena if they thought it was the end of the world. For an artist-and perhaps for anybody-it is the only way to grow.” Zinsser writes (237). You have to find what you love to do, and don’t settle, even if that means failing. In life we all have that moment of periodic defeat, and one can choose one of two options; count their loses and try again, or except the defeat and never try again. If you count your loses then you can either fail again, or you can succeed. If one excepts the defeat and never tries again, one could never know what could have happened if they tried again. Finally, don’t be afraid of missing opportunities, behind every failure is an opportunity somebody wishes they had missed.

Winston Churchill once wrote, “Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.” Winston Churchill, and Zinsser both thought the same thing about failure. There’s rarely such a thing as “failure” usually its success at finding what doesn’t work. Zinsser thought that failure was the key to success, and I agree. He also thought that college doesn’t have to define you as a person. Sometimes you have to face the periodic defeats in order to figure out what you need to do to succeed. Failure is not fatal, but failure could be the key to success and the key to happiness. “Maybe we are learning again to cherish this right of every person to succeed on his own terms and to fail as often as necessary along the way.” William Zinsser (237).