Most of us are familiar with the Steve Jobs resurrection story. He lost control of the Mac team under John Sculley, wandered in the “wilderness” of NeXT (as Sculley describes it), and then returned to Apple – building it into one of the most amazing companies in history.

Walt Disney, too, had his share of failure. Well before the Walt Disney Company (which was originally called Disney Brothers in partnership with Roy Disney), Walt founded Laugh-O-Gram studios.

Laugh-O-Gram produced animation shorts, including a series of break-even cartoons for a local theater. There were a number of business errors. Then, when a major New York City theater chain failed to pay for a series of expensive animations, Laugh-O-Gram went bankrupt. All Walt Disney had left was enough to buy a train ticket to LA.

As we well know, Jobs and Disney went on to create towering enterprises that have become integral parts of our culture. The lesson here is that even if you fail, that doesn’t make you a failure. Keep trying. Even when things are at their darkest, there may be light in your future.