Are you thinking about quitting? What if your success requires just one more attempt?

The problem is that we never know when that attempt will come. Success doesn’t send advance notice. There are no guarantees that the next phone call, presentation, sales meeting, interview, conversation, or proposal will be the one that changes everything. That uncertainty is precisely why so many people quit.

The people who ultimately succeed are often not the most talented or fortunate. They are simply the ones who continue long enough to discover what was waiting on the other side of one more effort.

Years ago, I was working on a car and got stuck trying to put some parts back together correctly. Frustrated and discouraged, I quit.

The car sat for months.

It created transportation issues, scheduling headaches, and a constant reminder that I had failed to finish what I started.
Finally, I got fed up and decided to try again.

Thirty minutes later, the job was done.

Thirty minutes.

I had been that close to finishing when I quit.

My experience reminds me of the famous story of R. U. Darby.

During the Colorado Gold Rush, Darby and his uncle staked a mining claim and began digging. Eventually they discovered a vein of gold. Excited by the discovery, they returned to Pennsylvania to borrow money from friends and relatives so they could purchase the equipment needed to continue mining.

They returned to Colorado and resumed their work.

Then the gold disappeared.

They searched.

They dug.

They tried everything they knew.

Eventually they gave up and sold the claim to a junk dealer for a few hundred dollars.

The junk dealer hired a mining engineer who determined that Darby had stopped just three feet from one of the richest gold deposits ever discovered in Colorado.

Three feet.

Sometimes a little more effort produces extraordinary results.

Just when you’re ready to give up, your breakthrough may be waiting on the other side of one more attempt.

You may not always strike gold if you continue.

But you have absolutely no chance if you quit.

The good news is that the story didn’t end there for Darby. He returned to Pennsylvania and entered the insurance business.

Remembering the lesson he learned in Colorado, he refused to quit when prospects said no. Eventually he became one of the most successful insurance salesmen in the country and earned millions of dollars, paying back every debt he had accumulated during his mining venture.

Where in your life might you be just three feet from gold?