Their beginnings:

A man was fired by a newspaper editor because, “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas.” After that, the man started a number of businesses that didn’t last too long and ended with bankruptcy and failure. (Walt Disney)

A man was turned down by Toyota Motor Corporation for a job after interviewing for a job as an engineer, leaving him jobless for quite some time. He started making scooters of his own at home, and spurred on by his neighbors, finally started his own business. (Soichiro Honda)

A man’s first product was a rice cooker that unfortunately didn’t cook rice so much as burn it, selling less than 100 units. (Akio Morita – Founder of Sony)

A young comedian walked on stage at a comedy club, he looked out at the audience, froze and was eventually jeered and booed off of the stage. (Jerry Seinfield)

After his first audition,a man was told by the casting director, “Why don’t you stop wasting people’s time and go out and become a dishwasher or something?” (Sidney Poitier)

During his lifetime, a man sold only one painting, and this was to a friend and only for a very small amount of money. While the man was never a success during his life, he plugged on with painting, sometimes starving to complete his over 800 known works. (Vincent Van Gogh)

The first book by this author received 30 rejections, finally causing the author to give up and throw it in the trash. His wife fished it out and encouraged him to resubmit it. (Stephen King)

A woman was nearly penniless, severely depressed, divorced, trying to raise a child on her own while attending school and writing a novel. (J.K. Rowling)

A man’s first story received six hundred rejection slips before finally being accepted. (Jack London)

I could go on and on with the list of people who initially were failures and had every reason to give up.

One of the biggest thing I brought away from Blissdom was “Don’t compare your beginning to someone else’s middle or end.”

So often when we are starting a project, we look to the ones who are a success and start judging ourselves against them. It’s easy to look at that and deem ourselves not as good or failures when we don’t become the next Walt Disney or Jack London right away.

So what does your beginning look like? Does it look similar to their beginnings?

GREAT! Keep believing in yourself and dare to keep going.

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