By Not Known
Many make excuses for not doing their best and not striving for excellent results but instead settle for the mediocre. Here are some people who offered no excuses but simply gave their best and accomplished excellent results.
At 19 months, Helen Keller became deaf and blind. But she was the first deaf-blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. Mozart was already competent on keyboard and violin and composed music from the age of 5. Anne Frank was 12 when she wrote her diary. Nadia Comăneci was 14 when she scored seven perfect 10 scores and won three gold medals at the Olympics for Romania. Jesse Owens was 22 when he won 4 gold medals in Berlin in 1936. Beethoven was a piano virtuoso by age 23. Isaac Newton at 24 wrote “Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica”. Roger Bannister was 25 when he broke the 4-minute mile record. Albert Einstein was 26 when he wrote the Theory of Relativity. Michelangelo created the two of the greatest sculptures “David” and “Pieta” by age 28. J. K. Rowling was 30 when she finished the first manuscript for Harry Potter. Amelia Earhart was 31 years old when she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Edmund Hillary was 33 when he became the first man to conquer Mount Everest. Martin Luther King, Jr. was 34 when he gave the speech “I have a dream.” Marie Curie was 35 years old when she was nominated for 4 Nobel Prizes in Physics in 1903. The Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur in their thirties when they invented and built the world’s first successful airplane and made the first controlled, powered and sustained heavier-than-air human flight. Leonardo Da Vinci was 51 when he painted the Mona Lisa. Dr. Seuss was 54 when he wrote “The Cat In The Hat”. J. R. R. Tolkien was 62 when “the Lord of the Rings” books were published. Ronald Reagan was 69 when he became President of the United States. Nelson Mandela was 76 when he became President of South Africa.
It’s not how young or old you are. It’s not how gifted or wealthy you might have been. It has to do with determination and perseverance, and a sense of calling to complete a task against all odds. It is the inner conviction that drives a passion. It is knowing for sure that no one else fitted that calling other than you.
Steve Maraboli once wrote, “At the end of the day, let there be no excuses, no explanations, no regrets.” When you come to the end of life, would you give one more excuse for not accomplishing what you should have?
God has called each one of us to unique tasks. Have you heeded that call and gone at it, offering no excuses along the way?
Peter Poon