When I was a child I had a game console, it was a model before Sega game console and after brick games. It was popularly called “Family Con”. Often times I would be seated playing for hours trying to finish the game. Some of the games I played included Contra (all its parts), Terminator, Spider man etc. The reason I spent a lot of hours playing this games wasn’t because I didn’t know how to play the games but because having passed a lot of stages and gotten really far in the game, I would fail or the power would be interrupted (N.E.P.A back in the day). Therefore, every time I sat down to play my game I would have to start over, it wasn’t until later on that Sony came up with Play-Station (PS) consoles where you could save your progress for a later time.

Adesina was the first and only child in his family to go to school, there was a lot of pressure on him to get admitted into the university. It was really devastating when after scoring well in WAEC and UTME exams he still didn’t get admitted. Adeshina however didn’t give up, he retook the exams,focused on his weaker areas and scored even higher . Today Adeshina is a Resident doctor at a renowned teaching hospital.

Derenle was the last son of his parents. His siblings didn’t get to have higher education due to financial constraints; however, they wanted Derenle to have that education so they did their best for him to attend the university. When he wrote the WAEC and UTME, he failed. Fearful and ashamed of his failure, he faked his admission letter and collected fees from his sibling for the four year duration of his course of study. While he worked as a sales boy in a supermarket, It wasn’t until two years after his supposed graduation, the truth came out and his family found out that he didn’t attend the university. Having realized his errors, and wanting to make something of his life registered night classes and put in better effort. He rewrote the WAEC and UTME; he passed and was admitted to the university to study Law. Today Denrele is a senior associate in a law firm.

You might wonder the reason for all the story, what point I am trying to make? At times in life we would be faced with failure, failure in academics, failure in getting a job etc. when faced with failure we are so much tempted to just throw in the towel, give up on life, get depressed or change our dreams. My message to you is that it’s ok to try again, it’s ok to start over though it could get really inconvenient and annoying but still we should try to try again. Certain times when I am faced with failure and giving up is my option, I try to ask myself “what will I gain if I give up?”  “what do I stand to lose if I try again?”

Alexander Graham Bell (yeah the guy who invented the telephone) did experiments upon experiments upon experiments, before he finally created the telephone. I wonder, what if he gave up on that dream? So many other great inventors like that faced failure, surely those would things have been done by someone else eventually but we be backwards in these technologies.

When next you are faced with failure, instead of giving up or wallowing in self pity, face your problems. Learn from failure. Instead of asking “why me?” ask”why did I fail?”,”Where did I go wrong?”, “How could I have done better?” Then with enough scrutiny you would learn from your mistakes, adapt and try again.

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