50 Famously Successful People Who Failed At First
February 25th, 2010
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It’s easy to look at famous people and assume that they must have stumbled onto overnight success somehow. We think they were born with amazing talent that was immediately appreciated by the world. Unfortunately, this makes it easy to think that if you’re not successful by now, there’s no point in trying.
Of course, this isn’t true, even though it may seem that way. It’s always good to be reminded that even the biggest successes are almost always preceded by numerous failures, and that persistence is the key to eventually being a success.
Someone emailed me to say they featured my blog in their post 50 Famously Successful People Who Failed At First. I was annoyed that this turned out not to be true (apparently the email was a sloppy copy and paste job), but anyway, it’s a good list of people who reached success only after they had gotten failure out of their system.
It’s broken up into categories: business gurus, scientists and thinkers, inventors, public figures, Hollywood types, writers and artists, musicians, and athletes. But be warned that I noticed a few factual errors.
Here are some of my favorites that I hadn’t heard before, and which appear to be true:
- Walt Disney was fired from a newspaper because “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas.”
- Oprah Winfrey was fired from her job as a television reporter because she was “unfit for TV.”
- Elvis Presley was fired and told “You ain’t goin’ nowhere, son. You ought to go back to drivin’ a truck.”
Do you know any successful failures who should be added?
Photo by Hammarstrand
February 26th, 2010 at 12:28 am
Wow, that’s a great list. I think everyone who has done something remarkable has failed in one way or another before achieving success, so I would extend that list to pretty everyone in this world
February 26th, 2010 at 10:57 pm
I think failure is more of the norm of to the path to eventual success. Bring me one successful person who hasn’t had bitter moments of failure. It may not be a hilarious failure like Oprah losing her job in TV business, but I am sure every successful person has had his share.
February 27th, 2010 at 7:32 pm
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February 28th, 2010 at 1:40 pm
@ Oscar, everyone in the world would make a pretty big list.
But yeah, I see your point. Everyone has their failures, we just don’t necessarily know about them.
@ Akemi, I’ll bring you one when I find one. Haven’t found one yet…
August 4th, 2010 at 4:55 pm
Fred Smith (creator of Federal Express) wrote a paper in college expressing his idea for FedEx. His professor told him it was a bad idea that would never take off. The professor might have failed him on the paper but don’t quote me on that.