Failure can bring shame and embarrassment or a feeling of discouragement. Fear of those effects often causes some people to make only a half-hearted effort or not to try at all. And yet, we learn from failures just as surely as learned to walk by falling time and time again as a baby. Success is often preceded by a string of failures, but that success would be impossible without the lessons failing brings.

The Bible tells us a righteous man falls seven times and rises again (Proverbs 24:16). A fall is a failure, but sitting in that failure will certainly guarantee that we will never succeed. Not trying is worse than failing. It may be time to put our vanity and ego aside if we see ourselves drifting aimlessly through life rather than trying. That old saying is golden: "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again."