Winners Aren't People Who Don't Lose

"When I was a child, I never won anything. I mean, never. I went to an academically competitive school, and while I suppose I was smart, evidently I wasn't smart enough to win any awards. This was in an era, long ago, when it had not yet come into vogue to tell children they were doing a good job. My school was big on telling children they were not trying hard enough."

"Often, my parents were told that I was not living up to my potential. And once, my mother was told that I always sat in the back row-and this was in a classroom that only had two rows. This kind of feedback was crushing to my self-esteem, not to mention other aspects of my self-confidence. It made me feel bad about myself. And you could easily think that this was destructive. However, what actually happened is that it made me mad, really, really mad."

"I went to a college that was as different from my high school as possible. It was a wonderful antidote. And then it went bankrupt. I had to find another college. And then I had to convince that new college to accept the credits from my beloved and highly non-traditional, now defunct, former school. Then I decided to go to graduate school to get a doctorate, something the director of studies at my high school would not have predicted. I didn't succeed the first year."

Childhood experiences of repeated failure and harsh feedback produced anger and resolve to prove critics wrong. Academic setbacks and lack of awards motivated a pursuit of psychology and education. College choice provided a contrasting environment but ended with bankruptcy, requiring transfer and advocacy to transfer credits. Graduate school applications required multiple attempts, with initial rejections followed by persistence across several years. The cumulative pattern shows that perseverance, willingness to endure frustration and failure, and continued effort can compensate for early lack of recognition and enable eventual progress toward advanced qualifications and professional goals.

Read at Psychology Today