Imagine a staircase. It has ten stairs, each painted green. Whenever you step on a green stair, you get ten dollars. Woo hoo! You get $100 for climbing the staircase, and you’re also rewarded for each individual step. Fun!
Now imagine another staircase, with ten stairs – but 3 are red, spaced out every third stair. When you step on a green stair, you get twenty dollars, but when you step on a red one, you lose ten. Climbing all ten stairs still nets you $110, which is awesome! You could feel bummed when you step on a red stair, but you’d have to be really short-sighted to feel that way.
This is literally everything in your life. There is some mix of advances and setbacks, but the point is that they’re all connected. They’re all part of the same process, one leading to another. Avoiding activities that have a chance of setbacks is just avoiding the staircase altogether.
The Opportunity Machine 