10 Inspiring People Who Overcame Personal Adversities and Became Successful

When successful people like Oprah Winfrey recalls how she was told she was “unfit for TV” at the age of 22, one cannot help but wonder what she must have gone through to become who and what she is today. Oprah isn’t the only successful person with an inspiring story of how they overcame adversity. The likes of Bill Gates, Albert Einstein, Michael Jordan, and Elvis Presley to mention a few, have their own stories to tell.

1. Albert Einstein:
   
   

   For a child who could only speak 3 years after his birth to be labeled as lazy and dull, and seen as someone who would never amount to anything, the choice of giving up on life would have been easy. But not for Albert Einstein to whom we are grateful to for some of the advances that have been made in science. Today, he’s well known for his theory of relativity.

2. Abraham Lincoln:
   
   

   16^th president of the United States of America Abraham Lincoln failed in business, lost his sweetheart as well as his job and many political offices he ran for, yet he became the President of the United States of America. How about a round of applause for him, Dick Cheney, and Franklin Roosevelt.

3. Franklin Roosevelt:
   
   

   To date, Franklin D Roosevelt is the only person in United States history to serve 4 terms, the fact that Polio incapacitated his legs notwithstanding.
   Below are some of the famous quotes by FDR:

   – The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. –
   – The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little. –
   – It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something. –

4. Thomas Edison:
   
   

   That fact that we have functional light bulbs today is because Thomas Edison who passed away on the 18^th of October 1931, created it. But it wasn’t an easy feat for the man who had over 1000 patents to his name. Thomas who was sent home from school and was home taught by his mother, failed over a thousand times when he was trying to make the light bulb. It never deterred him. When asked about his failures, he said, “I have not failed, I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work”.

5. Nelson Mandela:
   
   

   Madiba, as he’s fondly called, worked so hard to become a lawyer at a time when the South African apartheid system made life difficult for the blacks. Mandela went on to spend 27 years in prison from where he played a major role in the end of the apartheid rule in South Africa and eventually became the country’s President.

6. Walt Disney:
   
   

   Walter faced rejection from 302 bankers before he was able to secure funds to build his theme park after his first animation company went bankrupt. Aside from that, he had earlier been fired by a newspaper editor on the grounds that he “lacked imagination and had no good ideas”. I wonder what has become of that editor.

7. Bill Gates:
   
   

   Arguably the richest man in the world, that title didn’t come to Bill Gates on a platter of gold. Bill and his friend Allen failed in the first business they ventured into but turned the lessons they learned around and today, we’re grateful to Microsoft for Windows OS.

8. The Wright Brothers:
   
   

   Depression, illness, and failed prototypes stood in the way of Orville and Wilbur Wright in spite of several years of hard work, but it didn’t stop them from creating a machine that could fly at the beginning of the 20^th.

    

9. Jack Ma:
   
   

   The founder and executive chairman of Alibaba Group, has been through many failures in his life. He failed his exit exams multiple times in elementary school and middle school. He failed his entrance exams 3 times before being accepted into university. After college, he tried applying for jobs 30 times! And yet none of them hired him. He started 2 business ventures that failed in the end, but that did not stop him from trying. He created Alibaba in 1999, made zero revenue for 3 years. In September 2014, Alibaba went public at $92.70 per share, making it the biggest US IPO in history.

10. JK. Rowling:
    
    

    The Harry Potter series has made Rowling a billionaire. Her first Harry Potter novel was rejected by 12 publishers and the only one that accepted, paid her an advance fee of only £1,500. Fast-forward to 2014, she’s worth well over a billion dollars.

The likes of billionaire Richard Branson who had dyslexia, Jay-Z who was rejected by many record labels yet worked to create the prestigious Roc-A-Fella Records and even Stephen King whose first novel was rejected 30 times yet his books have sold 350 million copies to date, are some of the inspiring people whose stories of humble beginnings and their fight against personal adversities made them become successful.