Winning is fun, but it teaches you nothing. Failure is the best teacher in the world. Winning is a trophy, failing is an education.

From an article on Lifehack.org titled Winning is Fun, but it Teaches You Nothing ..

Winning is fun, but it teaches you nothing. Failure is the best teacher in the world. Winning is a trophy, failing is an education.

What does it mean to you to “fail better?” Better than someone else? Fail/fare a little better each time you try? Maybe it means to fail spectacularly! Go big or go home! Or how about failing but getting better along the way—getting better through failure—and learning something from the experience? I believe that is the key: to allow failure to be a springboard from which we succeed and grow.

Take risks when you can

From a CNNMoney feature titled The smartest advice I ever got by Chris Larsen Founder, E-Loan.com and Prosper.com …

“Cut the lifeboats.” I heard this from Jim Collins, who wrote “Built to Last” and was the best M.B.A. professor I had at Stanford. He pleaded with the class, saying, “You’re young. You can fail two or three times, even lose all your money two or three times, and you’ll be just fine. Taking that risk puts you in the path of wealth.”

If he hadn’t said that, I probably would have taken a job, like a typical M.B.A., instead of founding a company. Starting my own business seemed so risky, but maxing out credit cards or even going bankrupt isn’t so risky if you do it at a young age. You’ll never regret taking those risks, but you might regret it if you don’t.

“Sometimes quitting is strategic, and sometimes it can be your best possible plan”

From the a podcast titled “The Upside of Quitting” on Freakononmics.com

“To help us understand quitting, we look at a couple of key economic concepts in this episode: sunk cost and opportunity cost. Sunk cost is about the past – it’s the time or money or sweat equity you’ve put into a job or relationship or a project, and which makes quitting hard. Opportunity cost is about the future. It means that for every hour or dollar you spend on one thing, you’re giving up the opportunity to spend that hour or dollar on something else – something that might make your life better. If only you weren’t so worried about the sunk cost. If only you could …. quit.”