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9 Famous People Who Will Inspire You to Never Give Up | The Muse

Famous people who never gave up

This article is from our friends at learnvest, a leading personal finance site.

“never give up.” is probably one of the most clichéd phrases he will hear while building his career. But there’s a reason these sayings are clichés: You never know when success really is just around the corner.

We know that believing is easier said than done, so we’ve compiled the following stories of famous celebrities who definitely never gave up, like Sarah Jessica Parker, Stephen King, and J.K. rowling, for starters.

All of these people are household names now, but they didn’t become one easily. some lived in their car, some experienced family abuse, and almost all faced rejection after rejection professionally and personally, before finally setting foot in the door. read on and get inspired!

1. jk paddling

j.k. Rowling had just gotten divorced, was on government aid, and could barely afford to feed her baby in 1994, just three years before the first Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, was published. when she was buying it, she was so poor that she couldn’t afford a computer or even the cost of photocopying the 90,000-word novel, so she hand-typed each version to send to publishers. He was turned down dozens of times until finally Bloomsbury, a small London publisher, gave him a second chance after the CEO’s eight-year-old daughter fell in love with him.

photo courtesy of everett collection/shutterstock.com.

2. king stephen

king was broke and struggling when he first tried to write. he lived in a trailer with his wife, also a writer, and they both worked various jobs to support their family while pursuing their craft. they were so poor that they had to borrow clothes for their wedding and got rid of the phone because it was too expensive.

king received so many rejection letters for his works that he developed a system to collect them. in his book on writing, she recalls: “when i was 14… the nail in my wall could no longer support the weight of the reject sheets impaled on it. I replaced the nail with a dowel and continued writing.” He received 60 rejections before selling his first story, “The Glass Floor,” for $35. Even his now best-selling book, Carrie, was not a success at first. after dozens of rejections, he finally sold it for a meager advance to double-day publishing, where the hardcover book sold just 13,000 copies, not very well. Soon after, however, Signet Books signed for the rights to the paperback for $400,000, $200,000 of which went to King. success achieved!

photo courtesy of featureflash/shutterstock.com.

3. jim carrey

When Carrey was 14, his father lost his job and his family fell on hard times. They moved into a vw van in a relative’s yard, and the young aspiring comedian, who was so dedicated to his craft that he mailed his resume to the carroll burnett show just a few years earlier, at age 10, took a eight hour job. He factory work by day after school to help make ends meet.

At age 15, Carrey performed his comedy routine on stage for the first time, wearing a costume his mother made for him, and was totally smitten, but he didn’t flinch. the following year, at 16, he dropped out of school to pursue comedy full-time. He moved to Los Angeles soon after, where he parked on Mulholland Drive every night and envisioned his success. one of these nights he wrote himself a check for $10,000,000 for “acting services rendered,” which he dated to thanksgiving day 1995. just before that date, he arrived at his payday with dumb and dumber . he put the spoiled check, which he had kept in his wallet all along, in his father’s casket.

photo courtesy of everett collection/shutterstock.com.

4. tyler perry

perry had a difficult childhood. he was physically and sexually abused growing up, expelled from high school and attempted suicide twice: once when he was a pre-teen and again at age 22. At 23, he moved to Atlanta and took odd jobs when he began working on his stage. career.

In 1992 he wrote, produced and starred in his first theatrical production, I know I’ve changed, something informed by his difficult upbringing. Perry put all his savings into the program and it failed miserably; the race lasted only one weekend and only 30 people came to watch. he kept up with production, did more odd jobs, and often slept in his car to survive. Six years later, Perry finally broke through when, on his seventh appearance, the show became a hit. Since then, he has had an extremely successful career as a director, writer and actor. In fact, Perry was named Forbes’ highest-paid man in entertainment in 2011.

photo courtesy joe seer/shutterstock.com.

5. sarah jessica parker

Parker was born in a poor coal mining town in rural Ohio, the youngest of four children. Her parents divorced when she was two years old and her mother remarried soon after and had four more children. Parker’s stepfather, a truck driver, was often out of work, so the future star began singing and dancing at a very young age to help supplement her mother’s teaching income and feed her family of 10.

despite difficult times and occasional welfare, parker’s mother continued to encourage her children’s interest in the arts. The family moved to Cincinnati, where Parker enrolled in a school of ballet, music, and drama on scholarship. When she was 11, the family took a trip to New York City so Parker could audition for a Broadway play. the trip was a success: both she and her brother were chosen and the family moved to new york. Parker continued to work hard and land roles, eventually becoming the main character on the TV giant Sex and the City.

photo courtesy of featureflash/shutterstock.com.

6. colonel sanders (harland)

Colonel Harland Sanders was laid off from a variety of jobs throughout his career before he began cooking chicken at his roadside Shell gas station in 1930, when he was 40, during the Great Depression. his gas station didn’t actually have a restaurant, so he served diners in his adjoining personal dwelling.

Over the next 10 years, he perfected his “secret recipe” and pressure fryer cooking method for his famous fried chicken and moved on to larger venues. her chicken was even praised in the media by food critic duncan hines (yes, that duncan hines). However, as the interstate passed through the Kentucky town where the Colonel’s restaurant was located in the 1950s, it eliminated significant road traffic and the Colonel was forced to close his business and retire, essentially bankrupt. Worried about how he was going to survive on his meager $105 monthly pension check, he set out to find restaurants that would franchise his secret recipe: he wanted five cents for every piece of chicken sold. he drove, slept in his car and got rejected over 1000 times before finally meeting his first mate.

photo courtesy of wikimedia.

7. shania two

twain’s career actually began more out of necessity than sheer ambition. Her parents divorced her when she was two years old and she rarely saw her father. Her mother and stepfather, with whom she became close, often couldn’t earn enough to survive, so the two began singing in bars to earn extra money when she was only eight years old. p>

She remembers her mother waking her up at all hours so she would get up and act. sadly, when she was 21, her mother and stepfather were killed in a head-on car accident with a logging truck on the highway. Ella Twain put her career on hold to step in and take care of her three younger brothers (who were teenagers at the time). she sang at resorts and deferred her quest for stardom until her sister and her brothers were old enough to take care of themselves. only once her younger brother graduated from high school did she feel good about going to nashville to pursue her career.

photo courtesy of helga esteb / shutterstock.com.

8. blunt emily

Before Blunt was nominated for Golden Globes and landed starring roles on stage and screen, she could barely hold a conversation with her classmates: Between the ages of seven and 14, Emily stuttered profusely. As she told w magazine, “I was a smart kid and I had a lot to say but I couldn’t say it. It just haunted me. I never thought I’d be able to sit down and talk to someone like this I’m talking to you right now.”

But that all changed when one of her high school teachers encouraged her to take part in the school play, a totally unattractive feat given the fact that she had a hard time communicating. but the teacher continued to gently press and suggested that she try the accents and voices of the characters to help pronounce the words, and it worked. By her late teens, Ella Blunt had overcome her stutter and achieved the successful career that she has now.

photo courtesy of dfree/shutterstock.com.

9. oprah winfrey

oprah has faced many things throughout her public life (criticism about her weight, racism, intrusive questions about her sexuality, just to name a few), but she never let it get in the way of her ambition and motivation. When you look at her childhood, her personal triumphs are cast in an even more remarkable light.

Growing up, Oprah was allegedly a victim of sexual abuse and was repeatedly molested by her cousin, an uncle, and a family friend. She later became pregnant and gave birth to a boy at age 14, who passed away just two weeks later. But Oprah persevered, finishing high school as an honors student, earning a full scholarship to college, and working her way up the television ranks, from local Nashville network host to international superstar and creator of her own network. (we couldn’t help it).

photo courtesy of s_buckley/shutterstock.com.

more on learnvest

  • what does it take to not be afraid of money and life? 6 Answers From Leaders
  • How To Make A Financial Recovery: 3 Real-Life Stories Of Resilience
  • Be Courageous In Your Career: 7 Tips From Fearless Entrepreneurs

photo by emily blunt courtesy of dfree / shutterstock.com.

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