LESSONS FROM THE PAST

Experience, they say, is the best teacher. In most instances, we don't have to repeat those experiences since other people have experienced them before. As Andre Gide puts it: "Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again."



Rita Mae Brown is even more direct: "Good judgment comes from experience, and often experience comes from bad judgment." To which Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, adds, "We receive three educations, one from our parents, one from our schoolmasters, and one from the world. The third contradicts all that the first two teach us."



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A good example of a man who turned a handicap into a blessing is Arturo Toscanini. He owed his success – or at least his chance at success – to the fact that he was very nearsighted. How could that possibly help a musician? Well, at 19, he was playing cello in an orchestra. Since he couldn't see the music on the stand, he had to memorize it. One day, the orchestra leader became ill and young Toscanini was the only member of the orchestra who knew the score. So, he conducted it without a score and the audience gave him a good hand for it – and audiences kept on doing it.



If he hadn't been nearsighted, he might have continued playing cello in small European orchestras instead of becoming one of the greatest orchestra conductors who ever lived.



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When Leonardo da Vinci was working on his wonderful painting of "The Last Supper," he painted the face of a man he hated as Judas. But when he came to paint the face of Jesus, he tried again and again and failed. It was only when he painted out the face of the man he hated and put another in its place that he had a clear picture of the Lord's countenance. His hatred had created a "dead spot" between him and the work he was doing, and this had to be put right before even his marvelous ability could produce the finished work.



"One of the most expensive luxuries one can possess is to hate somebody," E.T. Wayland said. "A deep-seated grudge in one's life eats away at his peace of mind like a deadly cancer destroying a vital organ of his life."



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Do you recall when Edmund Hillary and his native guide, Tenzing, made their historic climb of Mount Everest? Coming down from the peak, Hillary suddenly lost his footing. Tenzing held the line taut and kept them both from falling by digging his ax into the ice. Later, Tenzing refused any special credit for saving Hillary's life; he considered it a routine part of the job. "Mountain climbers always help each other," he said.



Should the rest of us be any different? "We are not primarily put on this earth to see through one another, but to see one another through," said Peter DeVries.



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Thomas Alva Edison was talking one day with the governor of North Carolina, and the governor complimented him on his inventive genius. "I am not a great inventor," Edison said. "But you have over a thousand patents to your credit, haven't you?" queried the governor.



"Yes, but about the only invention I can really claim as absolutely original is the phonograph," Edison admitted. "I guess, I'm an awfully good sponge. I absorb ideas from every source I can, and put them to practical use. Then I improve them until they become of some value. The ideas which I use are mostly the ideas of other people who don't develop them themselves."



Here's another story about him. In attempting to find a filament for his incandescent bulb, he tried more than 200 different substances. "You have failed more than 200 times," he was told. "Why don't you give up?" Edison replied, "Not at all. I have discovered more than 200 things that will not work. I will soon find one that will."



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Your key for personal success is persistence, for persistence produces power. In 1831, a young man failed in business. In 1832, he was defeated for the legislature. In 1833, he again failed in business. In 1834, he was elected to the Legislature. In 1838, he was defeated for Speaker; in 1840 defeated for Elector; in 1843 defeated for Congress; in 1846 elected to Congress; in 1855 defeated for Senate; in 1856 defeated for Vice-President; in 1858 defeated for Senate; in 1860 elected to the President of the United States. His name? Abraham Lincoln.



"Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence," said Calvin Coolidge. "Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent."



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Chris Evert is one of the greatest female athletes of all time. She holds the 18 grand slam titles and an overall win-lose record of 1,309 and 146. In her seventeen-year career, she never ranked below number four. "The thing that separate good players from great ones is mental attitude," she said. "It might only make a difference of two or three points in an entire match but how you play those key points often makes the difference between winning and losing. If the mind is strong you can do almost anything you want."



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In The Crow's Nest, Clarence Day wrote, "Information's pretty thin stuff unless mixed with experience."

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