Failure.

It’s so strange to see myself in this magazine, growing up in the Asian community I was always the black sheep who wanted to do something that everyone thought was just crazy.  I never focused on my studies, all through out my childhood I would never be the one that anyone talked about and this was a good thing! It gave me the freedom to fly under the radar and do what I wanted to do. But I will admit that there were times where it sucked not getting any attention from your own community, the kids who did exceptionally well academically got all the attention and praise. I was always compared to the smart students who were extremely studious but I was lucky I had an amazing mum and dad.

Both my parents always gave me so much support, even when I was failing at school and in my entrepreneurial ventures they would always find something good in me. I’ll never forget what they said when everything in my life was falling a part..

“Son, no one gets back up like you do. No matter how many times you get hit, I see you always dust yourself off and get right back up. Son if there was any trait that I wish I was able to give you this is the one! Look at me and your mother we’ve had to rebuild our lives time and time again and no matter how hard things got we’re all still here standing strong.”  

My mum always instilled so much confidence in me, I remember what she’d always say as well!

“Have confidence in your capabilities, don’t wait until you’ve done something to be competent. You need to believe that you are capable and let your confidence be born from there. If you have to wait until you’ve done something to feel confident and competent then there are many things you won’t even begin to do.”

This was the key lesson that helped me take action right away. Taking massive imperfect action was how I become successful, I guess you can call it failing your way to success.

Just incase you’re wondering, the big print you see in the magazine “That Bai” means Failure. I feel that a lot of people now aren’t patient enough, they will pursue something and the moment they hit a road block or they fail they just give up and throw in the towel. It’s scary because it seems that the fear of failure trumps the excitement of success. The reason I wanted my article to be about failure and not my successes is because I want to share with my community that failure isn’t a dead end it’s just a detour that leads us to our dreams. The path to what we love isn’t a straight line, it’s filled with detours and we have to be willing to stay on course no matter how hard things get.

So I guess the answer to the question

“Vinh how did you get to where you are today?” 

is really a much simpler answer than I thought. I failed my way here. How about you? Where are you headed?