Life is an Art

                                                  Never Give Up!
“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.”  - Dale Carnegie.

A happy Friday to you and welcome to the best day of the week. TGIF!!!
It’s been a while this segment has been published but we’re all glad it’s back again.

Okay, the three lettered words above may be simple to say and believe but difficult to accept.

Most of us have lost many achievements because we gave up, we halted and turned back when passing through the road to success.
There’s hardly anyone who doesn’t know at least three success quotes by memory. It is easier to say or use as a status update but difficult to implement.

We see successful people and take them as our role model. We want to be like them. We wish to be like them. We pray to be like them.
How many of us have read what they experienced to become successful? The simple rule is to never give up!
I’ll give you stories of successful people and how they never gave up on their dreams.

Who is not familiar with the renowned author of the Harry Potter series; J.K. Rowling?

J.K. Rowling had gotten a divorce, was on government aid and could barely feed her baby in 1994.

She was so poor that she couldn’t afford a computer or even the cost of photocopying the 90,000-word novel. She manually typed each version to publishers.

Her novel was rejected dozens of times until Bloomsbury, a small London publisher have it a second chance after the CEO’s eight year old daughter fell in love with it.
J.K Rowling is one of the top richest women in the world and has million copies of her novel sold.

Colonel Sanders is the owner of the popular KFC. Here’s his story;

Colonel Sanders received his first social security cheque of $99 at the age of 65. He was broke, owned a small house and a beat up car.
He made a decision that things had to change. His friends used to like his chicken recipe very much and since that was the novel idea he had, he decided to act upon it.

He left Kentucky and started his travels to different US states to sell his idea. He would tell restaurant owners that he had a chicken recipe that people liked and he was ready to give it to them for free, in return for a small percentage on the items sold. He got rejections, but did not give up. In fact, he got 1000 rejections.

He got to 1009 before he got his first YES. With that one success, Colonel Hartland Sanders changed the eating habits of the whole world with Kentucky Fried Chicken, popularly known as KFC!

I remember vividly years ago when I watched The Teju Babyface Show. He had interviewed the blogger, Linda Ikeji. When asked how long it took to gain the success and popularity, her reply was that she had spent four years posting on her blog. She never gave up. She visited cyber cafes and kept on using her money to post articles till she gained a name.

The rule still remains to never give up! I hope you learn from these success stories and use it to shape your lives... yes, you can read the exclusive interview of a talented artist, Nnadozie Ekene on Saturday.

As always, life is an art. It is beautiful and lovely. Yet behind those aesthetics and design are challenges and disappointments. Life is not always the way we want it to be. Just never give up, laugh loudly, forgive quickly, love truly and never forget anything that made you smile!

Maryam AbdulWahab,  Life is an art.
“Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn”.   –Harriet Beecher Stowe.