If You Ain’t Successful Yet, Then The Story Ain’t Over

Many people in life are realists and “literal” types: they focus on the now, on what it is, and the present. While this isn’t a bad way to look at the world, it’s not the only way. Part of the art of success is developing the ability to look beyond your life as it is currently, and imagining the broader picture of your life, as if it was in a movie and you were the main character. What usually happens in a good story? There is a protagonist and some problem or struggle that he faces, and the story comes to a climax when he faces down the problem and conquers it. This is the structure of most every story ever written and its important that you understand the simple idea of a story and how it can affect your life.

The reasoning is actually quite simple. If you aren’t successful yet in some endeavour, then make sure that you know that your story is not over. Understand that you are just going through the struggle, just like the protagonists in the movies do, time after time. Struggle is a crucial part of any great story, because nothing great has ever been achieved without struggle of some kind. If you are thinking of quitting, take a moment to instead consider your favorite hero or movie character. How many times did he/she think of quitting? How many obstacles and struggles did he go through before finally triumphing in the end? If you have lost hope of achieving success, whatever the endeavour may be, you can always find some strength to keep going by believing that your story is not over. It is not over because you haven’t succeeded yet, and because your movie, the story that you are writing as you live daily, is not over. You are the author and you’re in control of what response you choose to take. You’re in control of when the hero (in this case, yourself) gives up, and that time simply hasn’t come yet! It might take months, it might take years, it might even take decades, but the story isn’t over until you decide it is. And even then, even if you’ve given up hope and have moved on: the story is waiting, waiting to be resurrected, waiting for you to rewrite the ending and finish like you’ve always wanted to it to finish.

If you’ve ever seen the movie Benjamin Button, you probably remember the story of the swimmer whom Mr. Button befriended while they were stationed in Russia. She had tried swimming the English Channel, many years before, and had failed. As viewers, we felt sympathy for her because her situation is all too applicable to our lives as well. At the end of the movie, Button declares, “For what it’s worth, it’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit… start whenever you want… you can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing.” And we eventually see the swimmer, victorious, emerging from the water, smiles ear to ear, as an old lady. Her story simply wasn’t over and she eventually triumphed. The lesson here is that your story isn’t over if you won’t let it die!

I don’t know how many times I’ve started something, only to give up and quit for whatever reason. At the time I may have wrote myself off, concluding that I just didn’t have what it takes and that I would never succeed. Others may have disparaged me, and the self-loathing would grow even stronger. These things happen, I’m not going to sugarcoat it. But small victories happen too – they’re real, and I’m testament to that. I may not reach my goal the first time, the second time, or even the 10th time, but that first breakthrough I make on my 15th try is the beginning of Act Three – the part of the story when we finally summon the courage, strength, and resolve to push through and conquer our demons.

Whether you’ve given up long ago on a dream or are currently losing hope in the pursuit of one, just know that you decide when your story ends. Personally, I choose not to end my stories until I’m content with how they end. I guess you can call me a sucker for happy endings, but to me, stories that end in failure just aren’t very good stories.