Succeeding is not easy. If it were, everyone would be successful and get what they want without moving a finger. But the truth is that behind every success story there is hard work, an effort to reach the goal or even a painful failure. In life, only those who are willing to do what others do not want, and those who do not make excuses, are the ones who get what they want.
That is the reason why today I want to share with you these 9 motivating success stories that will help you not to give up, and they will thrill you to read the great obstacles that these people had to go through. With them, what I want is for you to realize that your failures and your mistakes are not what determines who you are.
9 motivating success stories
It’s how you face them and how you decide to overcome them that will make you a winner. If all of them could succeed by being even poorer than you, being on the verge of death, or even being rejected by the whole world. There is no reason for you to think that you can not be like them.
1. The runner who could not walk
At only 8 years old, Glenn Cunningham was caught in the flames when a serious fire broke out in his school. When the firefighters rescued him, no one believed he could survive. His body, from the waist to the feet, was completely burned, and he had breathed too much smoke.
To the surprise of the doctors, this boy did not give up and survived the burns. But he had to pay the price: he could not walk. His thin legs were lifeless because of the fire. However, his determination to walk again was untamable.
He was always in his bed or his wheelchair, until one day he decided to lie down on the lawn of his house and reach the fence that surrounded the garden crawling with his arms while his legs dragged him.
He managed to get to the fence, he got up leaning on it, and for the first time in months, he was able to walk again, although his steps were short and it was very difficult to put one foot in front of another.
He did this every day, believing in himself and that someday he could walk again without help from anyone. And he achieves it. Sometime later, he was finally able to walk to the school. And when he mastered his steps again, he started running everywhere.
In 1934, this man that nobody believed that he would survive with 8 years, that surely would not have been able to walk again, was the best runner of a mile in the United States of all time.
He got it at Madison Square Garden in New York, after many sacrifices to recover the mobility of his legs throughout his childhood and adolescence. This athlete is the demonstration that with perseverance, positive thoughts, and strong willpower can overcome any obstacle of life, including death.
2. The entrepreneur who lived on the street with his son
This man had problems since childhood: his parents separated when he was very young, and his stepfather beat his mother, his brothers, and him.
Having no one to take care of them, they had to live in a foster home when they were only 8 years old. His first marriage failed because he abandoned a career in medicine, and his second wife also left him because he had failed in his job and was full of debt.
With no roof under which he could be because he had no money, he and his young son had to spend many nights sleeping in parks, subway stations, and even in a public bathroom.
He applied to be hired at an investment agency where he had to compete with more than 20 candidates doing tasks for which he was not paid while he had barely enough money to feed his child, and both had to spend the night in a shelter for Homeless people
Luckily, he was eventually hired in 1982, becoming a full-time job for the Dean Witter company.
And 5 years later, he founded his own investment company with which he finally achieved his dream: to be an entrepreneur and achieve financial freedom.
This man is Chris Gardner, the owner of Christopher Gardner International Holdings, which now has branches in such important cities as San Francisco, New York, and Chicago.
Her story was taken to the movies in the movie In Search of Happiness, played by Will Smith, and it is the perfect success story that shows that if you want to achieve something, you can do it whatever the situation you are.
3. The player whose shot almost ended his career
Sandeep Singh Bhinder got a job as a hockey player in 2004. Soon after, he became a valuable member of the Indian national team.
When he was at the height of his career, he was able to hit a ball with the hockey stick and make it reach 145 kilometers per hour. That’s why he became the best of his team.
But in August 2006 a tragedy happened: Singh was seriously injured while traveling to the World Cup in Germany because of an accidental shot that hit him.
He was almost paralyzed, and was in a wheelchair for the next two years, fearing that his career would be over forever.
But he did not give up: he did rehabilitation exercises every day, and after a very painful recovery, he was able to walk and run again.
In 2009 he became the captain of the national hockey team thanks to returning to be the best among all his teammates for the effort and hard work he did to recover.
4. The man that nobody wanted to hire
In 2009, this man was the computer engineer that nobody wanted to hire. Despite having more than 12 years of experience working in such important companies as Apple and Yahoo, none of the other technology companies that applied to hire him wanted to do so.
First, they rejected him on Twitter. Later, it was Facebook who said “no.” He spent a very difficult time thinking that he could not go back to work on what he loved because nobody wanted to hire him.
But instead of surrendering, he formed a team with Jan Koum (a partner who had worked with him on Yahoo), and together they created the application that has revolutionized the world of smartphones.
This man is Brian Acton, the founder of WhatsApp, the most important social network that exists at the moment.
This is one of the success stories with which you must realize that if the world rejects you, you must create your own and never surrender.
5. The dreamer who did not have good ideas
Before becoming the legend that it is today, nobody believed that Walt Disney could succeed. In 1919, he was dismissed from the newspaper where he worked because the editor said that ” he lacks imagination and does not have good ideas.”
In 1920, he formed a small business with another cartoonist but had to leave it because they hardly generated profits with it, and people told them they could never make money with a company of that type.
However, he knew that even if the world called him crazy, there were good ideas in his head that could triumph.
So he pursued his dream until years later he managed to found his animation studio. Although he was successful with this company, the benefits were not very large, and he could not pay the high salaries his employees had.
The study began to have too many debts, and in the end, it went bankrupt. Disney decided to move to the industry capital: Hollywood. Unfortunately, one of his partners there stole from Oswald, the lucky rabbit, the first character with whom Walt was very successful.
Any other person in his place would have packed his bags and come home crying.
But this genius decided to move on, and sometime later he created Mickey Mouse, his most important cartoon character.
The rest is history: Disney became a legend, and his studio is today one of the most important in the film industry.
6. The writer who was about to commit suicide
JK Rowling is known around the world for being the writer of one of the most famous sagas of literature: Harry Potter. But his life was not always successful or as good as it is now …
Her mother, with whom she had a great relationship of love and affection, was always sick since she was little. When she died, Rowling moved to Portugal to teach English and write.
It was there where she met her husband. But the marriage was not happy: her partner beat her, and she ended up separating from him and moving back to Scotland to be close to her sister.
At that time, the writer looked like a failure: she had divorced, she had no job, and she had barely enough money to support her daughter.
He even thought about committing suicide due to his great depression.
It was at this time that she started going to coffee shops where sometimes she could not even afford a coffee so that she and her little girl had a warm place to stay for a few hours since they could not afford to turn on the heating at home.
And he began to write at the tables of these cafés. All her girlish experiences, her depressed feelings and her love for her dead mother inspired her to create the first Harry Potter book.
As you read this story, always remember this: even if you are in a really bad situation now, nothing is impossible to achieve.
7. The genie of terror who had no money for shoes
Many people have read their horror books, or have seen films inspired by their novels. But few know the true story behind Stephen King.
With only two years, his father abandoned him, his older brother and his mother, and she had to take care of her two children as she could.
They had no help from anyone, and their mother could not afford to pay a babysitter to take care of their children. So when she went to work, she gave them books that she borrowed from the library so that the children would be entertained until she got home.
There began the great love of Stephen King for reading and writing.
He paid for his studies at the university doing all kinds of jobs. In class, some classmates laughed at him because he had his books tied with a belt, and his shoes had holes because he could not afford new ones.
Her mother worked extra hours at work to save $ 5 a month, and send them to her son. I could only save 5 dollars EVERY MONTH …
The first novel she wrote was Carrie, but she felt it was not good, and threw the book in the trash. Luckily, his wife rescued the work and encouraged him to improve it and to continue writing.
A short time later, he sent this book to a publisher, and when King had almost forgotten about it, they called him to buy publishing rights for $ 2,500 in advance.
This is how this writer who did not have money for shoes became the master of terror of the twentieth century.
Misery, The Shining, It, The Green Mile, The Dome, The Dreamcatcher … We have all read some of his books, seen any of the films based on his works, or know his name.
Stephen King is the perfect example that does not matter your circumstances or how poor you are: what matters is to believe in you and pursue your dreams until you reach them.
8. The hostess who was dressed in sacks of food
Oprah Winfrey is one of the best-known television presenters in the world; He has programs, books, and even his television network.
That is why it is surprising that this woman who has become one of the most successful businesswomen of our time did not have her first pair of shoes until she was 6 years old.
His mother was a teenager and single when he had her, and they barely had money to feed.
She lived in extreme poverty (her grandmother made her clothes with sacks of potatoes) and suffered sexual abuse that at 14 years left her pregnant. Your baby was premature and died at birth.
But she was an intelligent woman, and she knew how to communicate well. So, a few years later she struggled to get out of that situation and worked for free on a local radio station as an announcer to acquire skills in the media.
That’s how she rose little by little in her professional career, being hired in other channels, and at age 32 she got her first television program that made her famous all over the world.
If all these people who have been poorer than you have been able to reach the highest, even having great difficulties and problems in their lives, you can also achieve everything you want.
You have to believe in yourself, work hard, and never give up! Which of these motivating success stories has impacted you the most? Leave me a comment below and tell me what you think.