Topic 40 Never, never give up

To me personally the expression "never, never give up" sounds pretty optimistic, but not terribly (крайне, весьма, страшно) encouraging anyway. No matter how good this nice piece of advice is, it would not always be easy to do exactly what it tells you, that is, to brace up (подбадривать, собираться с духом) and to keep your head above water no matter what happens. I am not sure it is worth discussing whether this happy-go-lucky motto is in the right or in the wrong. I simply believe that for different people placed in different situations it may mean totally different things.

It goes without saying that for some this expression may sound like their personal life slogan. In my view, category of people has the whole life planned out for them in advance. They are very likely to have a set of short-term and long-term goals and to do their best to achieve them all. They would work hard, try many different ways to get to their aim and finally, they would most certainly succeed. Which at first may seem to be a fairly natural run of things. Their second favorite expression may be at first you failed, try, and try again. This is what they do and this is something they are good at. Sometimes it may also seem that they are just awfully stubborn (ужасно упрямый) and even stupid, not being able to see that some of their goals are just beyond them. But they still prefer to try to work for their so-called goals, regardless (независимо, не обращая внимания ни на что). No one wants to be a loser.

At the same time, I have the impression that once in awhile (У меня сложилось впечатление, что время от времени, недолго, некоторое время)? And quite good once in a while it is? it might be useful to be able to face up (смотреть в глаза фактам) the facts and realize that some of your goals are too much of a job for you. I don't think it means being pessimistic, by no means. This can be called realism though. If you have already tried to do some particular task a hundred of times and it still didn't get you anywhere, what's the use of trying? Wouldn't it be more reasonable to admit the hard truth, rather than to go on with the same senseless (бессмысленным) grind (зубрёжка, вдалбливать ученику) for ages? I believe that this capacity to admit your own failure is a highly important, but incredibly difficult thing to do.

Anyway, I suppose that giving up is not a part of the human nature. Because if it were, the rate of suicide will be incredibly high, because as I understand that is the greatest giving up ever. But well, things don't happen this way. So, if you don't succeed, you try again because first of all you don't have much choice left. If you failed the second time and the third time and then over and again. You just realize that you failed. And even if you did fail, what are you left with? You just have to put up with that (мириться с этим) and start getting by it. It's the easiest way, after all. The one many people go for.