Perseverance Is A Key To Success
“Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get tired of doing the hard work you already did. ” As Newt Gingrich clearly explains, perseverance is not something that is tangible; it is something that one has to work towards achieving through the mind and through actions. Anyone can achieve perseverance, whether they believe they will or not. While perseverance is an abstract term, it can be seen as a concrete concept through examples from literature, history, and personal experience.
Beowulf, the hero of the epic poem Beowulf, by an unknown author, demonstrates the meaning of perseverance as it is defined in the quote. Throughout the poem, Beowulf is faced with a number of battles in which he must continue to fight until there only one man left standing. First, he hears from sailors of the difficult life with which the Danes have dealt with over the past 12 years under the terror of and monster named Grendel, and he decides to help them. In the middle of the night, Grendel attacks the mead hall, Heorot, where Beowulf and his men are sleeping, and Beowulf catches his hands in a vice grip, just seconds after waking up. Immediately, Grendel is stricken with fear, but Beowulf does not retreat. He continues to persevere through the battle, where he ultimately fatally wounds his enemy to the point where he runs back home into his underwater lair to die. Following this fight, Grendel’s mother comes back to retrieve her son’s dismembered claw and for revenge, taking Beowulf with her into her cave. As the battle continues inside her cave, Grendel’s mother nearly kills Beowulf until he sees an ancient made by that he grabs and beheads her. After killing her, there is a sudden release of all evil from the land, leaving everyone to live in peace. Finally, after 50 years of ruling as king of the Geats, during a battle with a fire breathing dragon, all but one of Beowulf’s men flee in fear and cowardice, leaving him to fight on his own. As Beowulf if fighting the dragon, he is fatally wounded in the neck. Although he knows that this wound is detrimental to him, he and Wiglaf, Beowulf’s only remaining loyal warrior, continue to fight and persevere through the battle. After the defeat of this dragon, Beowulf realizes that it is finally his time, after all the years he had spent working his hardest to protect his people from any evil. All the years he had spent persevering through the tough times had finally payed off as he had served his people better than he could imagine.
One may believe that Henry Ford, inventor of the Ford car company, was a very successful man, but what many do not know is how he had to persevere in order to make his company work. The first time Ford had tried to start his company, the company was dissolved. The second time her tried, he left due to interference of his primary investor. Both times, Ford had to file for bankruptcy so that he could try to start his company again. It took Ford seven years to succeed, making him 40 years old. Over the years that Ford had been working his hardest to make his dream and his company work, the automobile industry had basically written him off, rendering him useless to them. This would be one of their biggest regrets, as he would work up to being the most successful man in the automobile industry at that time. During his success, Ford had another company, Dodge, join him by using his moving assembly line, who ended up becoming competition, but he did not let that intimidate him. He continued to push through and focus on his work rather than getting wrapped up in what could potentially bring him back to filing for bankruptcy. Through his perseverance, Ford was able to succeed and also help to industrialize the country.
Throughout my life, there have been many instances where I have not had the best grades in a specific class. Others are sometimes faster at understanding a concept that we are learning in class than I am, so I feel a little behind and slower than the rest. There have been a couple of instances where I had been failing a class and no matter the amount of effort I was putting in, it seemed that it just was not enough. Despite that, I always continued to work my hardest to bring the grade up so that I could succeed in the class. As long as I managed to bring my grade up to a passing grade, I knew there was a better chance at getting into the colleges I would be considering applying to in the future. Not only do I work my hardest to maintain those grades for college, I do so to try to keep that mentality of hard work and perseverance for when I get into the workforce and am faced with a tough challenge. Since I have experience with difficult situations like such, I can professionally and efficiently deal with the challenge in the best way I know how. Giving up on a piece of work is not how I was brought up, it would be a disappointment to myself and my family if that were the case. At school, whether I am having a good day or not, I must still work to the best of my abilities.
Perseverance is one of the most important traits a person can have as it helped Beowulf win his battles until his death, helps me continue to succeed in school, and helped Henry Ford finally get his company to successfully work. Anyone can achieve perseverance as long as they put their minds to it, and always remember to just keep trying.
