Over the past few years, I have come to realize the difference between wanting something and ‘WANTING SOMETHING’.
When I was younger, I watched various entertainers on TV, especially Presenters and my passion to be like them grew tremendously. Yes, I loved the idea of being famous, and having the paparazzi chasing you everywhere. What I didn’t know however, were the sleepless nights they spent working on becoming successful: (but for the few who had their careers handed to them on a silver platter). So as every other young person excited about fame would do, I set out to work towards my dream of building the Berla Mundi Brand.
Trust me, the first few months were difficult…. I struggled to find my true self as I kept comparing myself with, and trying to be like the personalities I had seen on TV. Boy was I depressed!!
The work never stopped… I learnt as I moved along that if I really wanted to grow my brand, I would have to be persistent, work harder than I ever had because TV work was not ‘jollof’. I didn’t have celebrity friends to help 'link' me or make my quest any easier, so my request to have them interviewed by me came with such scrutiny as they couldn’t entrust their brand to an unknown amateur and half of the time, my request was rejected. I would have personalities speak so harshly over the phone to me just because I needed their version of stories to make my headlines…and yes you guessed right; I never really made headway. My boss was constantly on me for putting mistakes on air, and not being hardworking enough and yes there were nights when I cried so much and made a vow never to return to work but someway somehow, I managed to always drag my melancholic self out of bed and back into my office to face another day and challenge altogether. I knew what I wanted… I knew what I had in me and I desperately wanted the world to see it, but doors kept shutting in my face… The pain I felt in my heart whenever I was rejected for being too ‘new’ as many organizers would have it, stung like a bee. It always felt as if a dagger had pierced my soul when I expected to be called upon for a job and it was given to the ‘more experienced’ ones. I still never was deterred because I knew, prayed and hoped for a day when I too, would be the master of this game. All I had to do was work, train myself to be better and never stop. People would see me everywhere and ask, ‘Do you even sleep at all’? Even till now, I can barely sleep because I’m always up to something but I understand that if you really want something, you have got to give it your all and its been my motto since day 1.
As my brand grew, I watched other young people come after me hoping to become like the big shots and yet gave up almost immediately they started. Why? Because ‘it was too much work’. Or because they weren’t getting paid enough! I’ve always been perplexed at how people have turned opportunities given them to waste and walked off in search of other dreams thinking that would be easier. Those people just ‘wanted it’ but never ‘WANTED IT’.
If you really desire something, you have to go the whole nine yards to get it. Yes, there would be challenges and hurdles to cross, but if you only knew what the end would look like, you would never look back. Building something from the scratch isn’t easy; it comes with failure, pain, dejection, misdirection and loss……but depending on how you handle it, you could reap some benefits; the ultimate being Success. All you have to do is to rise about the negativity, remind yourself regularly of how bad you want it, make up your mind to strike gold once you keep digging and never stop, and don’t settle for anything other than a WIN.
Not everyone who’s on top today got there with success after success. More often than not, those who history best remembers, were faced with numerous obstacles that forced them to work harder and show more determination than others.
Most people know Oprah as one of the most iconic faces on TV as well as one of the richest and most successful women in the world. Oprah faced a hard road to get to that position, however, enduring a rough and often abusive childhood as well as numerous career setbacks including being fired from her job as a television reporter because she was “unfit for TV.” Did she quit? No!!
Bill Gates didn’t seem like a shoe-in for success after dropping out of Harvard and starting a failed first business with Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen called Traf-O-Data. While this early idea didn’t work, Gates’ later work did, creating the global empire that is Microsoft.
Walt Disney rakes in billions from merchandise, movies and theme parks around the world, but that didn’t happen in a day. Walt Disney himself had a bit of a rough start. He was fired by a newspaper editor because, “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas.” After that, Disney started a number of businesses that didn’t last too long and ended with bankruptcy and failure. He kept plugging along, however, and eventually found a recipe for success that worked.
These people ‘WANTED IT’ and they got it. Don’t just want it, WANT IT. Always 'B'. YOU!!!