Speak with the vast majority of people and what you will quickly discover is that they share a common belief about how success happens. It is a belief that has been frequently perpetuated by newspapers, magazine, television and more recently, social media. What all of these purveyors of information, these pillars of wisdom, these distributors of knowledge lead us to believe is that when success comes it comes rapidly, virtually overnight. With little effort, with little resistance and with little to no setbacks or obstacles.

There are two things that separate us from virtually everything else on the planet. The first is opposable thumbs (a trait we share with a handful of primates, koala bears and some South American tree frogs). However, it’s the second trait that truly makes us uniquely human. It is our ability to take in, process information and make conscious choices based upon it.

What if the one thing you avoided most, something you dreaded and feared, was the most important part of succeeding?Most people hate the very idea of failure. They loathe thinking of themselves as coming up short, missing the mark and not succeeding. For many, just the possibility of failure is enough to convince themselves that it is not even worth trying. Isn’t always better to set the bar low, keep expectations in check and minimize the risk?