“Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.”
~ Winston Churchill

What this quote means to women entrepreneurs:
I am no stranger to failure, at least as it is defined in the dictionary: “lack of success.” Of course, this means you need to know what the dictionary says success is: “the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.”

So, according to the dictionary, you’ve experienced a failure when your actions do not lead to your expected outcomes.

But is that really a failure?

If you look at failure through this lens, it would be easy to get discouraged. You set out to accomplish something, say fill a coaching program, and no one signs up. You could look at this as a sign that you were never meant to do this. Time to give up your entrepreneurial dreams and get a day job.

Or, you could look at failure as just an unexpected outcome, something to learn from. So, when no one signs up for your coaching program, find out why. Was it:

• wrong timing?
• wrong offer?
• wrong mix of features?
• insufficient number of people seeing your offer?
• miss-match of audience and offer?

You see, so many things can cause your actions to have unexpected results. But if you take those “failures” and learn from them, you will, eventually, succeed.

Of course, there is one other key ingredient: maintaining your enthusiasm. Don’t let unexpected outcomes rain on your parade. If you have a passion for what you do, fuel that passion, and keep ongoing. Eventually, you’ll create a synergistic mix of

• right timing
• right offer
• right mix of features
• the right amount of the right people seeing your offer
• perfect match of audience and offer

and then your coaching program will be an “overnight success”!

Now It’s Your Turn:
Do you agree with my interpretation of today’s quote? Why or why not? What are your thoughts on the relationship of success and failure? Do you have tips for fueling your passion so you keep going in the face of “failure”? Please share your thoughts, experiences, and sage wisdom in a comment below.