WHEN THERE IS ENOUGH SUNLIGHT, FLOWERS WILL THEN BLOOM!

• Failing university exams twice. It was not until the third time that he successfully got into his dream school due to his not-so-excellent academic performance.
• Failing all 30 times applying for different jobs. He was desperate until the point that when KFC’s recruitment had 24 applicants, 23 people had been accepted yet he was the exception.
• His start-up project failed in the first 3 years and he used to consider his startup idea as “1,010 mistakes.” However, in the end, that person became a billionaire of a country with nearly 1.5 billion people., creating job opportunities for thousands of people and bringing great benefits to the country,…

Can you guess who is the person with such a surprising profile?
That is Jack Ma – the father of Alibaba, one of the major e-commerce corporations in Asia, who accounts for the 30th position in “The most powerful men in the World” list voted by the Times magazine (USA) in 2014; and is also one of the “50 Greatest Leaders in the World” (2017)

I think many people would know this billionaire, or Alibaba Group if you regularly use services related to buying and selling international products online.

If you have been following Truly Inspired for a while now, you will notice that we have always tried to share real stories based on our lives or our clients’ stories, those who we have had the pleasure of working with. However, sometimes, I still want to use a different method to approach sharing stories with you. That is to bring people with high popularity and success into my articles.

It is not because they are successful and have great achievements that I choose to bring them in as examples. It is mainly because I know that, among my Truly Inspired readers, or even some of the younger colleagues in my team, there are people who have big dreams, but their starting conditions and support were not that good.

The starting point that I am talking about here contains financial conditions, the foundation of family education, and personal conditions that they may have. That starting point might seem to be the complete opposite of their desire, which leads to them thinking that it is difficult to do something great in life.

I am also a person born and raised in a family where I was not being supported in good conditions. Thus I have lots of brothers and sisters so it was not always possible for my parents to take care of each child thoughtfully. Therefore, I truly understand if you are in a situation that is unfavorable to developing well in your education or career.

However, this is one of the methods that brought me a wider perspective on life. Let me share with you:

I usually have and follow a list of famous people, or people who are widely influential due to their talent, success, or human achievements. At each stage in life when I encounter problems, I will read or listen to their quotes or biographies repeatedly many times as a way to push myself forward when facing difficulties and obstacles. Thanks to that, I have understood one thing: Every success has challenges, and the greater the success, the greater those obstacles are!

Incidentally, people who I follow often have similar problems and difficulties as myself at some point. In the past, when I encountered financial drawbacks, I would learn from people who successfully overcame financial pressure, and came up empty-handed, using their achievements as a motivational source for me to put more effort into my work. If I encountered family, love, or manners problems, I would learn from people who promote human core values, who share and help others with the mindset of giving away without asking anything in return, to learn how to open up my heart even more.

Then, incidentally,
A few days ago, I had a conversation with a boy who had just graduated from university a few months ago. Coincidentally, ever since he finished the 4th year final exam, when started applying for jobs at companies, he only received declines from all 21 companies’ human resources departments that he went to be interviewed for because of his inability to speak well. At that time, I was thinking, hehe the universe truly knows how to organize our destinies when I had the opportunity to talk with this boy right after I just re-read articles about Jack Ma a few days ago. When I heard him share the story, I also mentioned the story above along with some jokes like perhaps he will become a person with such a special achievement. Then we both burst into laughter!

Did you know?
Although he got rejected by 21 companies, especially in those first tries where he was extremely sad and had lots of negative thoughts about himself, when he went through those last 5 interviews and reached the end of 21 declines, he had developed a more open mindset. Instead of thinking that he failed every interview, he thought of them as opportunities to meet and experience discussions with many different human resources departments. From there, he will gain more opportunities to improve and perfect his communication skills with interviewers, and maybe the next meeting will be better than those previous ones. Perhaps his vitality, faith, and dreams were the only things that brightened his mood on the days of receiving rejections from recruiters.

Now, do you know what his results are currently?
Unexpectedly, yesterday he told me that he had applied and got accepted for a job at a foreign language center as a salesman. Therefore, after 21 rejections, he finally found a job where he enjoyed working in and earning an income. I also did not forget to tease him, “You have succeeded after only 21 times being declined. Perhaps after the 30th rejection, you could become a big boss like Jack Ma!”

You see, success or happiness are gifts that God has prepared for each of us since we were born. However, there will always be challenges of all levels that go along with those gifts to see if we truly deserve that gift or not. Therefore, he always wraps those gifts with ugly, dark, even thorny, painful, and disappointing wrappers so that we have to patiently peel off each of those wrapping layers. Once the wrappers have been removed, although our hands will have a few more scars, the hidden gift inside will bring us overwhelming happiness!

I always believe that as long as I keep trying and working hard, everything will result in a positive destiny. It is just that on that journey of experience, I will have to go through some low points. At those low points, I will try to fill them by temporarily borrowing other people’s strength and energy to pull myself back together. Just like flowers. To meet conditions to bloom brilliantly, it must “borrow” the people’s efforts of taking care of it for months and days, enough sunshine and water supply, and even appropriate weather conditions. It is not until when the time is right that they will grow and strongly develop themselves!

Therefore, if right now you are still feeling stuck, breaking down in this difficult life, rest assured because there will eventually be a time when great things come to you! My dear friend, try to “enjoy” the storms today, so when there is enough sunlight tomorrow, flowers will bloom!

Much love,
Truly Inspired®