In general, avodas Hashem requires us to realize our shortcomings and make demands on ourselves in order to improve. However, if we frequently fail in a particular area, the yeitzer hora tries to convince us to lose all hope for success and give up the fight.
So what should we do if we are assailed by thoughts of despair? Rather than rush to demand less of ourselves, let’s maintain and boost the feel-good factor; a hurt self-image is just too damaging.
Let us turn up the volume of the applauding and cheering at the smallest effort that we make to magnify kevod Shamayim. The successes, however rare, should prompt plenty of self-praise. We earn recognition even when a sharp, "Hold it there!" served only as a slight delay before giving in. Though the slimy Satan may have commandeered the situation in the end, nevertheless, Hashem still treasures every tiny bit of our efforts.
It isn’t only black or white. When one despairing young man confided in Rav Yisrael E. Weintraub, ztz״l, about all his shmiras einayim failures, the sage would have none of it. "You cannot imagine how fabulous the reward is for every second one battles with his yeitzer hora, even if he emerges as loser," he replied.
The Chafetz Chaim would comment on the familiar phrase: "We toil and they (the nations of the world) toil." When they toil, it’s the results - not the sweat - that counts. But when we toil, congratulations! The toil itself is success.