Character
In 1962, four nervous young musicians played their first record audition
for the executives of the Decca Recording company. The executives were
not impressed. While turning down this group of musicians, one executive
said, "We don't like their sound. Groups of guitars are on the way out."
The group was called The Beatles.
In 1944, Emmeline Snively, director of the Blue Book Modeling Agency,
told modeling hopeful Norma Jean Baker, "You'd better learn secretarial
work or else get married." She went on and became Marilyn Monroe.
In 1954, Jimmy Denny, manager of the Grand Ole Opry fired a singer
after one performance. He told him, "You ain't goin' nowhere son. You
ought to go back to drivin' a truck." He went on to become the most
popular singer in America, named Elvis Presley.
When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone in 1876, it did not
ring off the hook with calls from potential backers. After making a
demonstration call, President Rutherford Hayes said, "That's an amazing
invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?"
When Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, he tried over 2000
experiments before he got it to work. A young reporter asked him
how it felt to fail so many times. He said, "I never failed once.
I invented the light bulb. It just happened to be a 2000-step process."
In the 1940's, another young inventor named Chester Carlson took his
idea to 20 corporations, including some of the biggest in the country.
They all turned him down. In 1947 - after seven long years of
rejections! He finally got a tiny company in Rochester, New York,
the Haloid Company, to purchase the rights to his invention, an
electrostatic paper-copying process. Haloid became Xerox Corporation
we know today.
Wilma Rudolph was the 20th of 22 children. She was born prematurely
and her survival was doubtful. When she was 4 years old, she
contacted double pneumonia and scarlet fever, which left her with
a paralyzed left leg. At age 9, she removed the metal leg brace she
had been dependent on and began to walk without it. By 13 she had
developed rhythmic walk, which doctors said was a miracle. That same
year she decided to become a runner. She entered a race and came in
last. For the next few years every race she entered, she came in
last. Everyone told her to quit, but she kept on running. One day
she actually won a race. And then another. From then on she won every
race she entered. Eventually this little girl, who was told she would
never walk again, went on to win three Olympic gold medals.
The moral of the above Stories: Character cannot be developed in ease
and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the
soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success
achieved. You gain strength, experience and confidence by every
experience where you really stop to look fear in the face. You must
do the thing you cannot do. And remember, the finest steel gets sent
through the hottest furnace. A winner is not one who never fails, but
one who NEVER QUITS! In LIFE, remember that you pass this way only
once! Let's live life to the fullest and give it our best.
Author Unknown