“Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly.”
Day of Affirmation Address (1966)
Context: The second danger is that of expediency: of those who say that hopes and beliefs must bend before immediate necessities. Of course, if we must act effectively we must deal with the world as it is. We must get things done. But if there was one thing that President Kennedy stood for that touched the most profound feeling of young people around the world, it was the belief that idealism, high aspirations, and deep convictions are not incompatible with the most practical and efficient of programs — that there is no basic inconsistency between ideals and realistic possibilities, no separation between the deepest desires of heart and of mind and the rational application of human effort to human problems. It is not realistic or hardheaded to solve problems and take action unguided by ultimate moral aims and values, although we all know some who claim that it is so. In my judgment, it is thoughtless folly. For it ignores the realities of human faith and of passion and of belief — forces ultimately more powerful than all of the calculations of our economists or of our generals. Of course to adhere to standards, to idealism, to vision in the face of immediate dangers takes great courage and takes self-confidence. But we also know that only those who dare to fail greatly, can ever achieve greatly.
Source: Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead
“Only those who have dared to let go can dare to reenter.”
Quoted in Geary's Guide to the World's Great Aphorists (2007) by James Geary, p. 232
“Only those who attempt the absurd can achieve the impossible.”
in 1989 - towards the end of his Presidential term
Source: Pranab Mukherjee Press Information Bureau in: Speech by the President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee at the concluding function of the centenary celebrations of the former President of India, Dr. Neelam Sanjeeva Reddy http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=102099, Press Information Bureau, Government of India President's Secretariat
About Abraham Lincoln, speech on the 21st anniversary of Lincoln's assassination https://www.lib.rochester.edu/index.cfm?PAGE=4071 (1886).
1880s
Excerpt from My Life by Oswald Mosley (1968), Ch.16.
