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Writer's pictureTony Ademi

Stories of Celebrities Who Didn't Quit Too Early



As human beings, we tend to have that feeling of giving up very easily. Maybe it can be because we are tired of trying or even because we are listening to others too much.


Before you are about to give up, here are a few stories of some celebrities who refused to quit and now regret just thinking about it.



Jack Ma



Today, you see Jack Ma as a billionaire worth over 40 billion dollars, but what happened to Jack Ma before he got to this level?


Jack Ma grew up in a communist country- China. Today, he is 57 years old and during his lifetime he has been rejected by many universities, jobs, and even failed many exams for university entrances. He relatively had a poor life and grew up in a poor family.


He failed his university exam entrance twice and finally passed the exam on the third try. As soon as he graduated, he applied to so many jobs anyone can think of and got refused by all of them, even by McDonald's and KFC. He would later become an English teacher but get a terrible salary of only 12 dollars a month!


The biggest advantage Ma had was that he got to use the internet first out of the others. When he first searched on the internet, his first search was "beer", where he would later find out that there were no results for Chinese beers. This was the exact time he thought of finding an internet company for China.


Jack Ma would fail two ventures, where after 4 years he had enough and would gather all of his friends together at his place. He spoke to all of them about the idea of "Alibaba" and convinced them to invest with him and support him.


Many may think Alibaba started in the 2010s, but it actually managed to hit the million-dollar mark in late 1999. It raised all the money from Goldman Sachs and SoftBank. Jack Ma told his team that he will never quit and that they will become a worldwide company, that is exactly what happened!


In the 2000s, Yahoo invested 1 billion dollars in Alibaba to get 40% of the company's stake. It was only a decade later where Alibaba would go public and made Ma the richest man in China with a net worth of over 20 billion dollars.


When Jack Ma was applying for a job at Mcdonald's, he was the only one to get rejected. What could have been a simple employee now became a multi-billionaire!


Eric Thomas



Eric Thomas, a world-class motivational speaker that has touched the world with all of his motivational words. Today, at age 50, he is still going strong. How did Eric Thomas (The Hip Hop Preacher) get to where he is today?


He was born to a single mother and dropped out of high school after various arguments with his parents. Thomas would leave his house and live homelessly for 2 years in the streets of Michigan. While he was homeless he met someone that inspired him to go back to school. He would then later get a job at an Olive Garden in Detroit, Michigan. During his studies, Eric would meet his wife, only to later get married as college students.


If you listen to Eric's motivational videos, he will mention many times that it took him 12 years to get a degree. He graduated in 2001, considering that just after 2 years he would start working at Michigan State University. While giving a speech at Michigan State University, it became a trend worldwide when he said "When you want to succeed as bad as you want to breathe, then you'll be successful!". It was from that point on when Eric hit the worldwide rankings.


He would later start his own company, known as a motivational speaker. He has many motivational series on Youtube, with a Youtube channel of over 1 million subscribers and over 1 thousand videos. Eric has also written many books referring to his life struggles and achievements. Books that have sold in great numbers.


Even though Eric Thomas once use to sleep in abandoned buildings, today he is worth multi-millions. 99.9% of people would have already given up, but he saw the beauty of life and continued to give his best every day.


Elon Musk



Elon Musk is as of now the wealthiest man in the world, with a net worth of nearly 200 billion dollars. A man who is the CEO of Tesla, PayPal, SpaceX, and the co-founder of OpenAI and Neuralink.


His parents got divorced when he was only 9 years old. He chose to stay with his Dad, which he later regretted and said that he was a very evil person, and did every bad thing you could imagine. He claims that this was one of his worst decisions ever, but he was a kid then again.


At only 12 years old, he learned how to program from a manual. From there, he would create a game and sell it to a computer magazine for $500. Elon claims it was better than Flappy Bird, back then.


While he was in school he got bullied a lot and beaten very badly. He once got pushed down the stairs where he would receive medical treatment. He also claims that he use to get beat so bad, he would blackout!


One of his first entrepreneurial moves was renting a 10-bedroom house and turning it into a nightclub. By getting paid by many students, he would pay his rent this way and make money. Smart, isn't it?


One of his first greatest successes was in 1999 when he joined teams with PayPal from his X.com company. A banking company that has made transferring money very easy and is widely used today. Just after he did this, he would buy a Mclaren F1 and be one of the only 60 to own it worldwide.


Following the many successes, he has had, including Tesla and the most recent idea he has of sending people to Mars and colonizing it. Elon Musk has also claimed that he once lived on 1 dollar a day, eating only hot dogs every day. Having a tough life at school and in his personal life, Elon Musk kept shocking the world with his impressive ideas and still does. He is a person we should all look up to.


Dan Lok



Dan Lok, you may or might not know who he is. Usually, the ones who are very into business know about him. This is the veteran copywriter with a net worth of over 100 million dollars. Businessmen see him as a genius who knows how to simplify everything he says and make you understand it so easily.


Today, he rides in Bentleys, has penthouses, and much more things you can imagine. Before Dan Lok got to this level, what was his life like before all of his fame? It definitely was filled with hardship!


Dan Lok was originally born in Hong Kong to a low average income family. At a very young age, his parents divorced, and that caused Dan & his mum to relocate to Vancouver, Canada. His dad promised he would provide for them until one day, he made a call and told them he was about to go bankrupt...


During this period, Dan Lok tried multiple industries and tried to earn money in any way possible, in order to support his mum. He failed in every single industry he tried and would later on go into debt, after failing 13 businesses! He would start a business together with one other guy, and get scammed, just after giving him 150 thousand dollars!


Dan would get very frustrated and didn't know what to do, he claims he almost attempted suicide. Although, he then started copywriting. He met his mentor Alan Jacques where he would start his copywriting career. He would do re-writing for some clients online and wrote some impressive content, starting as a foreigner with no English at the age of 15!


At only 27, he would become a self-made millionaire. Dan claims his mentor- Alan, is the reason behind all of his success. What is really interesting about Dan Lok is that he failed in every industry he stepped foot in, got bullied at school, was told he would never make it, and so much more. Even being 150 thousand in debt, Dan didn't stop there, he saw more to life and kept trying. Today, all the people doubting him are looking up to him and see him as a man who has inspired millions around the world.


Steve Jobs



There is no chance you don't know this man. This is the legendary creator of all the products we use now of Apple or the well-known iPhone.


Steve Jobs passed away in 2011 but has been a great influencer to the world, especially technology-wise. He transformed the way we use our smartphones and eventually, how we can enhance technology.


At a very young age, Jobs dropped out of college and tried various ways on how to make money, right before he co-found Apple in 1976. Jobs was unnamed and given for adoption from his college graduate parents. He was then named "Steve" after he got adopted.


His career all started in his garage where he and his "father" worked with electronics, where Jobs would get taught how to take apart and reconstruct electronics.


Only 2 years before he co-founded Apple, Jobs worked as a video game designer with Atari. He would then travel to India for spiritual enlightenment and experiment with several drugs.


With his great teamwork with Wozniak (the founder of Apple), Jobs and Wozniak managed to leverage Apple to billions of dollars in just 4 years! You may be shocked, but after some struggles, Jobs was forced out of his own company in 1985. He would later come back and put the company back on track, a decade later.


What Steve Jobs struggled a lot in his life was initially trying to find a direction to follow, and being kicked out of his own company in 1985. That didn't stop him, only to come back and make Apple the richest company in the world as of now, a company worth a trillion dollars!


Conclusion


Based on some stories you just read about in this blog, if you are someone who is thinking of quitting, think twice. Never quit just because you don't see results right now. It may take years before you get anywhere, but it is always worth it.


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