The only failure is the failure to rescue something. The difference between triumph and defeat isn't about your willingness to take the risk — it's about mastery of rescue afterwards.
Atul Gawande
Williams College Commencement 2012, 2012
Video starts at 17:45 — the moment this quote was spoken
The Story Behind This Quote
Gawande closed with his own failed career attempts: he tried to become a philosopher and proved mediocre, started a rock band with terrible songs (one compared his love for a girl to the decline of Marxism), and worked on healthcare legislation that not only went nowhere but set back reform for almost two decades. But from each failure he took away ideas, experiences, and relationships that transformed what he was able to do when he finally found his place in medicine.
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