If you want to achieve greatness to impress others, your undertaking may be doomed before it even starts. This is because many of the people who achieve greatness aren’t seen as great at first. Stephen King, for example, was told that his first novel, Carrie, would never sell. It went on to sell 1 million copies in its first year, but as he says in On Writing, he was only able to continue writing because he was in it for his own passion: “I did it for the pure joy of the thing. And if you can do it for joy, you can do it forever.”  For example, the list of now-famous authors who were rejected at first, even many times, is incredibly long. Jane Austen’s first several novels were rejected by multiple publishers, even though she’s been considered one of the greatest writers in the English language for close to 200 years now. Frank Herbert, author of the world’s best-selling science-fiction novel of all time, Dune, was rejected 23 times before someone agreed to publish his novel -- and even then, they weren’t sure they were making the right choice. The history of scientific achievement is also a history of people who were considered wrong or even insane before time and study proved them right. Astronomer Galileo publicly supported the Copernican idea that the Earth revolved around the Sun in 1610 and -- despite the fact that his findings were correct -- was persecuted by the Catholic Church for heresy. He wasn’t officially pardoned by the Vatican until 1992. It may seem trite, but learning from your mistakes is a hallmark of the great. People who continue to make the same mistakes over and over again tend not to get very far. According to best-selling author and inventor Scott Berkun, understanding four basic types of mistakes can help you understand them and prevent them:  “Stupid” mistakes are things that just happen: you order the wrong coffee, you leave your keys at home, you stub your toe coming up the front steps. Being human pretty much guarantees that these things will happen occasionally, and there isn’t a whole lot you can do to avoid these. “Simple” mistakes are mistakes that can be avoided, but that weren’t avoided because of a series of decisions you’ve made: for example, paying late fees on movies you rented because you didn’t take your car in for maintenance and it went out on you and you couldn’t get to the video store on time. These take a little effort to address, but they can be fixed fairly simply once you recognize what went wrong. “Involved” mistakes involve more effort to keep you from making them, even though you probably already know what the mistake is: eating bacon at every meal, always arriving late when you go to the movies with friends, wanting to finish writing a novel but not making time to write. These mistakes require a significant amount of commitment and thought to prevent, because they often tend to be the result of bad habits. “Complex” mistakes are, well, complex. They often have significant consequences and no clear way to keep from making them again: failed relationships or business ventures, actions that had unexpectedly negative consequences. Ask yourself questions about your mistakes. It can be really uncomfortable to examine your own mistakes in detail, but it’s crucial for you to learn. Questions such as “What assumptions did I make in this situation?” and “What were my goals here?” will help you figure out what to change. J.K. Rowling openly talks about her initial failure -- living after college as a single mother with next to no income and multiple rejections from publishers -- as what motivated her to keep trying with her writing. Failure “meant a stripping away of the inessential,” a way for her to see that even though her greatest fears had been realized, she could make it. People who ask for advice and support from other people, such as asking for help when you keep making the same mistake and don’t seem able to change, or asking for honest critique of your work, are more likely to succeed in the long run. Just make sure you reach out to people who love and support you so that the feedback is useful and not simply brutal. Tenacity and perseverance are signs of greatness. People like Jesse Owens could have given up when they encountered horrific racism, but Owens did not and went on to win 4 gold medals and break a variety of records.  Perseverance should be coupled with learning from your mistakes. If the things you try don’t work out the first time, keep trying, but also learn from your mistakes and change the outcome for the better. For example, if your goal is to achieve literary greatness but no literary agents are picking up your novel, you have to consider a few things: maybe you need to re-write it (have a trusted friend or family member look it over and give you some ideas), maybe you should try to go the route of self-publishing, maybe you need to keep trying. J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter was rejected 12 times and she was told “not to quit her day job.” Walt Disney was fired from the newspaper at which he worked because he was considered to have no imagination or good ideas. He had to dissolve the first film company that he formed because he couldn't pay rent and when he tried to have MGM distribute Mickey Mouse, he was informed that the idea of a cartoon mouse would never sell.  Oprah Winfrey, who had already had a rough and abusive childhood, was told that she was unfit for TV when fired from her job as a TV reporter. Like Rowling and Disney, she did not let that stop her, and she is now one of the world’s most iconic and influential women. To achieve greatness you have to leave your comfort zone. Research has shown that individuals need a space just outside their comfort zone, called the “optimal anxiety” zone, to push themselves to higher performance levels. The more you’re willing to challenge yourself, the more your comfort zone expands.  Start small: turn off your GPS on a roadtrip for a while, order something you’d never normally try at a restaurant, approach a perfect stranger and strike up a conversation. While you may not always succeed, you will always learn new perspectives. Ask yourself: if, at the end of your life, you look back on this choice, would you regret not making it? It’s important to try to distance yourself from how you may feel in the present, because most people fear risk in the short-term. However, they also are more likely to regret not taking those risks later.  Believe it or not, by taking controlled, informed risks, you actually make yourself more resilient to dealing with unexpected challenges, too. Putting yourself and your works out into the world is the only way that people are going to see and acknowledge that work. It can be terrifying to show your first draft of a novel to someone, or put up your photography on a website for everyone in the world to see, but exposing yourself to others’ opinions and critiques is the only way you’ll improve and ultimately achieve greatness.  If you're an artist, make a website and put your work up online so that people can see examples of your art. Talk to galleries or even coffee shops in your community about hosting some of your work. Network! Go to professional events in the field you’re trying to achieve in whenever possible. If you want to be a great artist, go to gallery openings and workshops. If you want to be a great scholar, go to the best conferences. You have to see what others are doing and be willing to talk about your own work. Even as you're succeeding, you will need to keep learning -- and not just from the mistakes you make. Keep looking at how other people are achieving their goals and see if you can incorporate that into your own life.  Try to make yourself better each day. Consider donating to a cause you think is worthy, or use your writing skills to cheer up a friend. Doing an act of kindness or compassion can help you feel better about yourself, which in turn will help with your confidence in achieving your goals. Stretch yourself to learn new things. If you're really good at mathematics, try to get in some literature or history. If dancing is what you're trying to do, take a break to learn about art or computer science. Learning something new keeps your brain active, it keeps you from becoming too relaxed, and it can give you new avenues for inventiveness and creativity. It will also help you challenge confirmation bias, or the tendency to look only at the information that supports what we already believe.  Seeking advice and knowledge from others can also help stimulate your own greatness even if they are in very different fields from you. As you're achieving your goals on your way to greatness, always seek out the help and guidance of others. There isn't a single person who has achieved something that hasn't been helped in one way or another by people in their community, whether through schooling, through a single kind act, or through access to social programs. When you have achieved greatness, don't forget to give back to your community and to the people who helped you along the way, the person who edited your first manuscript, the people who convinced you to join track, the people who taught you how to code, etc.
ليكن دافعك داخليًا. تعلم من أخطائك. لا تيأس. غادر نطاق ارتياحك. اخرج بعملك للعلن. لا تتوقف عن التعلم. لا تعمل وحدك.