PROFITING BY FAILURE 863My first position in Chicago was that of advertising manager
for a large correspondence school. I knew little about advertising, but
my previous experience as a salesman, plus the advantage gained by
rendering more service than that for which I was paid, enabled me
to do particularly well.
The first year I earned $5,200. I was coming back by leaps and
bounds, and gradually I again began to see the shining pot of gold
almost within my reach. History is full of evidence that a feast usually
precedes a famine. I was enjoying a feast but did not anticipate the
famine that was to follow. I was getting along so well that I thoroughly
approved of myself
Self-approval is a dangerous state of mind.
This is a great truth that many people do not learn for the better
part of a lifetime. Some never do learn it. But those who do are those
who finally begin to understand the strange language of defeat.
I am convinced that we have few, if any, more dangerous enemies
to combat than that of self-approval. Personally I fear it more than I
fear defeat.
This brings me to my fifth turning point, which was also of my
own choice.
Fifth Turning Point
I had done so well as advertising manager of the correspondence
school that the president of the school induced me to resign and go
into the candy manufacturing business with him. We organized the
Betsy Ross Candy Company and I became its first president.
The business grew rapidly, and soon we had a chain of stores in
eighteen different cities. Again I saw my rainbow's end almost within
reach, and again I believed I had at last found the business in which
I wished to remain for life. The candy business was profitable, and
because I looked upon money as being the only evidence of success,
I naturally believed I was about to corner that success.