At Least Fails While Daring Greatly

Going to the next level in your life requires you to take difficult challenges. That, needless to say, is hard. You must move out of your comfort zone. You might also encounter failures along the way.

For such a situation, I find “The Man in the Arena” by Theodore Roosevelt inspiring. It’s a section of his speech “Citizenship in a Republic” that he delivered in 1910. Here is an excerpt:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

I love it! I especially like the part “if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.” I find that part incredibly motivating. Yes, you might fail, but at least you fail while daring greatly. That will put you in a much better position than those who do nothing, “those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

If you are now facing a big challenge, remember this: face it with boldness and give it your best shot. Life is too short to be spent sitting on the sidelines. Let people find you in the arena.

Photo by Bigstock

4 Comments

  1. The last paragraph sums it up! “If you are now facing a big challenge, remember this: face it with boldness and give it your best shot. Life is too short to be spent sitting on the sidelines.”
    Well said, Donald.

  2. Great stuff. We have to take action, to do. Increasingly, for me the choice of taking a risk and doing the stuff of dreams is more complelling than the comfort zone of dull drudgery.

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