Jerry Seinfeld performs at New York’s Beacon Theatre during his Netflix special “23 Hours to Kill.”

Jerry Seinfeld is a world renowned actor and comedian who was the pinnacle of comedy for quite sometime during and after the release of his hit comedy show about “nothing”, Seinfeld, in the 1990s leading into the 2000’s. Jerry’s success is very apparent, but his life before Seinfeld is very much an enigma for many people. Like many successful people, Jerry Seinfeld had pursued his career and passion through thick and thin to get to where he is today. He had to face his own mistakes and failures and come out the other side having learned from the experience. Now, his career in comedy might seem distant and unrelated to the passions of a great multitude of people, however, the attitudes and mental state of Jerry during his series of drawbacks can help us glean useful feedback for our own passion journey.

Jerry had always enjoyed comedy ever since he was a little kid who would follow his dad around continually writing jokes. He just loved to make people laugh and he found a lifelong passion for doing so. Like many comedians, Jerry Seinfeld got his start by doing stand-up for various comedy clubs around New York City. And as you can probably guess, it didn’t go so well at first. The night of his college graduation, Jerry didn’t celebrate with a party, but rather he spent the night doing his first ever stand-up routine at a local comedy club in NYC. When he got on stage, he completely crapped the bed. He had forgotten all of his lines and proceeded to stand there dumbfounded, and eventually he was able to force some random words that were kindly received by the audience. Although many would consider this to be the defining moment that would show the world and oneself that this may not be the right career, Jerry took it as inspiration to do what he couldn’t the first time. He dedicated himself to the proper preparation and lifestyle of a stand-up comedian.

Jerry Seinfeld on an episode of “Benson”

Jerry went on and continued to perform at club after club, which miraculously led to an appearance in a Rodney Dangerfield HBO special. This was a great resume booster, but unfortunately it was nothing more. A few years later in 1980, Jerry got a part in the scripted comedy show Benson, and he was promptly fired after four episodes due to creative differences. He only found out when he showed up for a script reading to discover they had removed him from the show and neglected to tell him. For Jerry this was very disheartening and rightfully so. He had finally made it to stage and was told he had no place there as his lack of acting and comedic skill was overwhelmingly apparent. Instead of quitting or taking time off, Jerry began the plans for a new show that he would be able to write for and act in, but for the time being, he steadily continued his stand-up work.

Larry David on “Curb Your Enthusiasm”

Throughout the 1980s, Jerry would go on to slowly grow his career with increasingly frequent appearances on late night shows and eventually his first comedy special on HBO. Then using this momentum, Jerry was able to bring his new show, Seinfeld, to fruition in 1988 with the help of co-writer Larry David. Ever since then, the rest is history as Jerry blew up and became one of the largest comedians at the time and continues to be today. Looking back, if Jerry had thought his first night of stand-up was one of failure rather than a successful learning experience to further push his skill development, we might have never had the generational trauma of people constantly trying to impersonate Jerry or recite lines from the show. Jokes aside, Jerry became extremely successful by simply doing and working on his passion at a slow and steady pace, and by mitigating his failures by just looking at them from a different angle. Of course not everyone’s dreams will work out in the end, but you’ll never know if you turn away at the first sign of failure.