Problems are a Normal Part of Change

When asked, "How do you develop mental toughness in life?",
my response might sound negative at first when I answer,
"Always be prepared for a surprise. The surprise might be a
negative surprise.

Something is going to happen in your day, whether you are
late because you got stuck behind a train or your car had a
flat tire -- something is going to happen... And the key is
your ability not to take mole hills and look at them as
mountains."

Problems are a normal part of change. Things are changing so
rapidly that there are going to be problems you face. So you
must look at failure as an event, not as a person. I'm not a
failure.

Maybe I've had a failure or a temporary inconvenience. I've
had a stumbling block, and the idea is to turn the stumbling
block into a stepping stone, and step on it instead of
stumble over it. So look at failure as the fertilizer of
success.

Fertilizer stinks, it smells. You see that guy putting it on
his lawn and you say, "Wow, that guy fertilized his lawn."
You fertilize your mistakes. You don't wallow in them, lay
in them, roll in them; you pick yourself up off your
mistakes and learn from them. You try not to repeat that
same thing again. But you look at it as a temporary
inconvenience, as a detour -- a detour in life -- not as a
failure."