Then when the golf course business suffered a downturn， David sold out. Now he buys， leases， and manages airports around the country. What did David learn from failure？ Patience and perseverance， for sure. He never gave up on his dream. When the market dropped in the golf business， David also took stock and realized that his real skill wasn’t managing golf courses， it was managing businesses. So he simply transferred that skill over to another arena.
David， who is now on the board of my Life Without Limbs nonprofit organization， told me the bigger the challenges we endure， the greater our strength of character. “Nick， if you‘d been born with arms and legs， I don’t think you would be as successful as you will become without them one day，” David said. “How many kids would listen to you if they couldn‘t see right away that you have turned what should have been an incredible negative into something so positive？”
Remember those words when you experience challenges. For every blocked path， there is an open one. For every “disability，” there is an ability. You were put on this earth to serve a purpose， so don’t ever let a loss convince you that there are no ways to win. As long as you draw breath with the rest of us mortals， there is always a way.
I‘m grateful that I’ve failed and persevered. My challenges made me more patient and more tenacious too. Those traits have come in handy in my work and in my play. One of my favorite ways to relax is to go fishing. My parents first took me when I was just six years old. They‘d stick my pole in the ground or in a holder until I got a bite. Then I’d tuck my chin around the pole and hold on to the fish until someone could come and help me.
On one day I wasn‘t having much luck， but I hung in there， watching my line for three hours straight. The sun roasted me to a crispy crimson， but I was determined to catch a fish that day. My parents had wandered off， fishing down the shoreline， so I was alone when a fi sh finally hit my bait. I stomped my hand line with my toes and screamed “Mum！ Dad！” until they came running.
When they pulled it in， that fish was twice my size. But I never would have landed him if I hadn’t hung in there and refused to let go with my toe.
Of course， failure can also build humility into your character. I failed in my high school accounting class， which was a humbling experience. I was afraid that maybe I didn‘t have what it took to be a numbers cruncher， but my teacher encouraged me and tutored me. I studied and studied， and years later I earned a double degree in accounting and financial planning.
I needed that lesson in humility when I was a student. I needed to fail so I could learn that I didn’t know all I needed to know. In the end， humility made me stronger. The writer Thomas Merton said， “A humble man is not afraid of failure. In fact， he is not afraid of anything， even of himself， since perfect humility implies perfect confidence in the power of God before Whom no other power has any meaning and for Whom there is no such thing as an obstacle.”
It motivates you
We can choose to respond to loss or failure by despairing and giving up， or we can let the loss or failure serve as a learning experience and motivation to do better. A friend of mine is a fitness instructor， and I‘ve heard him tell clients who are bench-pressing weights to “go to failure.” Now that’s encouraging， isn‘t it？ But the theory is that you keep pumping the iron until your muscles are exhausted so that next time you can try to exceed that limit and build more strength.
One of the keys to success in any sport and in your work too is practice. I think of practice as failing toward success， and I can give you a perfect example that involves me and my cell phone. You may think the smart phone is a great invention， but for me it is a gift from heaven. Sometimes I think the inventors must have had me in mind when they created a single device that even a guy without arms or legs can use to talk on the telephone， send e-mails， text messages， play music， tape-record sermons and memos， and keep up with the weather and world events just by tapping it with my toes.
The smart phone isn’t quite perfectly designed for me since the only part of me that can use the touch screen is a long way from the part of me that can talk！ I can use the speaker feature most of the time， but when I‘m in an airport or a restaurant， I don’t want to share my conversations with everyone around me.
I had to figure out a way to position my cell phone closer to my mouth once I‘d dialed it with my foot. The method I devised gives new meaning to the term “flip phone” and offers a bruising lesson in the role of failure in success. I spent a good week trying to use my little foot to flip my phone onto my shoulder， where I’d pin it down with my chin so I could talk on it. （Kids， don‘t try this at home！） During this trial-and-error period， you can believe I failed in many attempts. My face had so many bruises from getting hit by the phone that I looked like I’d been smacked with a bag full of nickels.