Being brave is what led to three rejections from Yale Law School before being accepted. It led to losing my 2010 race for U.S. Congress, and another failed bid for public office in 2013, this time for public advocate of New York City. Reshma Saujani More Quotes by Reshma Saujani More Quotes From Reshma Saujani 'Fail hard, fail fast, fail often. It's the key to success.' This one I learned from experience! Reshma Saujani key-to-success failing keys Don't be afraid of failure. That's not an easy lesson for teenagers - especially teenage girls - to learn. Our society sends us a lot of messages that imply we're supposed to be ashamed when we fall short. But I think we should be throwing each other failure parties! Reshma Saujani encouraging teenage girl Teach one girl how to code, she'll teach four. The replication effect is so powerful. Reshma Saujani four girl powerful Coding is the language of the future, and every girl should learn it. As I've learned from watching girls grow and learn in our classrooms, coding is fun, collaborative and creative. Reshma Saujani girl creative fun Embracing failure is the most important trait I've developed in my career. I have tried to learn from my failures, and I believe it has made me stronger, more confident and more resilient. Reshma Saujani confidence stay-strong believe We can't think of any better way of becoming our best selves, than by finding something we're great at! Reshma Saujani self way thinking If you haven't failed yet, you haven't tried anything. Reshma Saujani ifs havens Fail fast, fail hard, fail often. Reshma Saujani hard failing I'm the daughter of refugees. The immigrant mentality is to work hard, be brave, and never give up in your pursuit of achieving the American dream. Reshma Saujani never-give-up daughter brave work Computer science is not just for smart 'nerds' in hoodies coding in basements. Coding is extremely creative and is an integral part of almost every industry. Reshma Saujani just smart creative science Most girls are taught to avoid risk and failure. We're taught to smile pretty, play it safe, get all A's. Boys, on the other hand, are taught to play rough, swing high, crawl to the top of the monkey bars, and then just jump off headfirst. Reshma Saujani jump monkey smile failure Never give up. People will always discount you, and you'll always get rejected. But set your sights high. Be boldly ambitious. Be relentless and never give up. Reshma Saujani never-give-up never you people I've chosen opportunities where I might fail rather than live in the shadow of my own potential. Reshma Saujani live own my-own shadow I never take for granted how lucky I am to be an American and what a privilege it is to spend each day at a nonprofit dedicated to helping the next generation of girls achieve their dreams. My journey, as the daughter of refugees, shows what refugees and the children of refugees can create for all Americans. Reshma Saujani dreams day daughter journey There's no more powerful lesson than knowing that your setbacks will one day help you succeed. Reshma Saujani will day you succeed You're never too young or too old to be a mentor. Reshma Saujani old never you mentor There has been little to no attention from policymakers to the economic inequalities young people face. Instead of job creation policies, our country's youth are faced with tuition hikes. Reshma Saujani face job youth people Coding, it's an endless process of trial and error, of trying to get the right command in the right place, with sometimes just a semicolon making the difference between success and failure. Code breaks and then it falls apart, and it often takes many, many tries until that magical moment when what you're trying to build comes to life. Reshma Saujani moment failure success life I think as automation gets even more and more prevalent, we're going to need to learn how to code. Everybody does. Reshma Saujani need more think automation I'm glad I didn't know how much patience entrepreneurship required. It took some time to turn that into a strength of mine, so that would've presented an obstacle when I was younger. Reshma Saujani know strength time patience