Keep Trying!

Yesterday at work we had our Spring Devotional. The speaker was Dr. Charles Litchford, a professor of Sales & Service Technologies at Weber State University. His topic was "Keep Trying!" He started out by telling us that words, whether written or spoken, by themselves only have a retention rate of about 30%. But when you start adding elements to involve more of your senses finally culminating in setting it to music, the retention rate of the message is 100%. Thus the commercial 'jinlge' used to sell just about everything from underwear to jewlery. As an example, he used the following:

I'm not judged by the number of times I fail, but by the number of times that I succeed. And the number of times that I succeed is in direct proportion to the number of times that I fail and keep trying.

Dr. Litchford illustrated this by saying the words, then adding elements and finally grabbing his guitar and playing a rythym of simple chords and singing it to us. Must have worked. I can still recite those 40 words today!

He went on to explain why failure is a key ingredient of success with these 5 attitudes and backed each up with examples of where we are taught these principles in scripture:

1. I never see failure and failure, but only as a learning experience.
2. I never see failure as failure, but only asd the negative feedback I need to change my course of direction.
3. I never see failure as failure, but only as the opportunity to develop my sense of humor.
4. I never see failure as failure, but only as an opportunity to practice my techniques and perfect my performance.
5. I never see failure as failure, but only as the game I must play to win.

So remember...

I'm not judged by the number of times I fail, but by the number of times that I succeed. And the number of times that I succeed is in direct proportion to the number of times that I fail and keep trying.

Keep trying (keep trying).
Keep trying (keep trying).
You will succeed if you keep trying!
Keep trying (keep trying).
Keep trying (keep trying).
You will succeed if you keep trying!!!