Sometimes it’s not about just working smart, there are a lot of people out there who are as smart as you are and even more. The difference is the hard work. The heart and soul you put into something is what makes all the difference.
What if you still fail? You will never have to regret that you didn’t try hard enough 🙂 It’s a win win.
Eddie Arcaro dreamed of becoming the world’s greatest jockey but after watching him ride a horse for five minutes, reality reflected a harsh contradiction. He was awkward and clumsy, and in his early years in the saddle he couldn’t do one thing right. He was left behind at the post, he got trapped in traffic jams, he got bumped and boxed in. In his first 100 races he never even came close to winning. Still, he got right back on and tried again. Even as a schoolboy, Arcaro had set his own track in life. Because he was only a little over five feet tall and weighed barely 80 pounds, the other students shunned him. So he played hooky instead, hanging out at the local race track where a trainer let him gallop the horses. His father reluctantly agreed to let him pursue a career as a jockey, even though he knew it was a long shot. The trainer had told him so. “Send him back to school,” he said. “He’ll never be a rider.” No one was betting on little Eddie Arcaro, no one that is except Arcaro. He was determined not just to ride, but to become the world’s greatest jockey. But first someone would have to give him a chance. He pleaded and persisted until he finally got to ride in a real race. Before it was over, he’d lost his whip and his cap and had almost fallen off the saddle. By the time he finished the race, the other horses were on their way back to the stables. He’d come in dead last.
There were long years when he was broke, homesick, and almost without friends. There were also many brushes with death and several broken bones. Every time his delicate 63 inch body was trammeled by hoofs he would get patched up and return to the saddle.
Then it happened. Arcaro began to win…and win…and win…Now, instead of leaving a path of destruction, he was leaving a path of devastated opponents. In thirty years of riding, he won 4,779 races, becoming the only jockey in history to win the Kentucky Derby five times. By the time he retired in 1962 he was a millionaire and a legend in his own lifetime.
From the moment he walked out of school and onto a track, Eddie Arcaro had his mind on a finish line. And although the race took thirty years, he never quit until that line was crossed.
A certain king had a son. Although in his late teens, the son looked very small and bony. His spindling legs, sunk chest, thready muscles and a poor stamina to match, indicated that he needed help. The royal doctor suggested nutritious food and tonics to vitalise the young prince, but nothing worked. He still remained weak and under-developed. The king became very worried and wanted a solution. One day, as good luck would have it, a wandering monk came to the king’s palace. He was given a warm welcome and was accommodated in the royal guest house. The monk, endowed with a keen power of observation, soon learnt of the king’s worry and offered to help the young prince. He asked the king to send for the royal sculptor. When the sculptor arrived, the monk asked him to carve out a statue of a fully grown up, well-built man. He wanted a full-size statue with perfectly formed muscles and biceps, well expressed in it. The sculptor followed the instructions and made the statue ready in a short time. ‘Look here, young man,’ the monk addressed the young prince, ‘you must keep this statue in your room and look at it as often as you can.’ Thus saying, the monk went away. The young prince, having placed the statue in his room, would look at the statue everyday. When he got up in the morning, he looked at the statue. As he walked in and out of the room, he looked at the statue. While sitting, studying, eating, resting, all through the day, his eyes fell on the statue. ‘Can I too have a well formed and beautiful body as this?’ the prince asked himself one day. He had developed a desire to be what he admired. Soon, he learnt how to do physical exercises, how to lift weights, flex his muscles and follow other related rules of body building. Within a few months, the skinny, bony, young man was transformed into a strong, well formed muscular figure. The statue had transformed a weakling into a strong man, just a statue.
Swami Vivekananda said, ‘Take up one idea. Make that idea your life– think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success.’
Yes! You can ignore the thumbnail.
Aman Gautam 