On page 8 (in the Prologue) of her autobiography Running Tide (1987, with Sally Baker) Joan Benoit Samuelson observes:

I guess I will eventually experience true success and true failure; I have not met with either yet. The only real failure is the failure to try. Perhaps one day I will find myself unwilling to try; I hope not. But should that day arrive, I will know what failure is. Similarly, it seems to me that real success comes when a person is able to say of one of her accomplishments, "That is a good job well done," and then leave that accomplishment behind. When I run a good race I think about how I might have done better and what I will do next time. True success eludes me, but I may be setting impossible standards for myself. Some day I may have to be satisfied with something less than the goals I set for myself: then and only then will I feel tested.

(cf. Joan Benoit Samuelson (2008-01-06), ...) - ^z - 2008-02-05

(correlates: Comments on ImpossibleStandards, OppositeAttractions, Inventing a Running Machine, ...)