This is an awesome speech by Eric Thomas. Re-posting this so that I can read this whenever I feel down.
There
was a young man that wanted to make a lot of money, right? So he went
to this guru and told him, “I want to be on the same level that you’re
on.”
The guru told him, “If you want to be on the same level I’m on, I’ll meet you tomorrow at the beach.”
So the young man got there at 4 A.M, all ready to rock and roll, got on a
suit when he shoulda wore shorts. The old man grabs his hand and says,
“How bad do you want to be successful?”
He said, “Real bad”
The old man says, “Walk on out into the water.”
So he walks on out into the water, waist deep. So, to himself, he’s like, “This guy is crazy”
He’s thinkin’, “I wanna make money, he’s got me out here swimming. I don’t want to be a life guard, I want to make money.”
The old man says, “Come out a little further.”
He walked out a little further, out to his shoulder area. He’s thinking,
“This old man is crazy, he’s makin’ money but he’s crazy.”
The old man says, “Come out a little further.”
He came out a little further, it’s right at his mouth and he’s thinking,
“I’m about to go right back, this guys out of his mind.”
So the old man said, “I thought you wanted to be successful?”
He said, “I do!”
The old man said, “Walk a little further.”
He did, he walked a little further. The old man grabbed his head, under
water, held him down, the guy was kickin’ and scratchin’, still holding
him down, he had him held down and just before he was about to pass out
the old man raised him up.
“When you want to succeed as bad as you want to breath, then you’ll be successful.”
I don’t know how many of you have asthema, you have a asthema attack,
you’re short of breath, you’re weezin’, the only thing you’re trying to
do is get some air. You don’t care about no basketball games, you don’t
care what’s on TV, you don’t care about a party. The only thing you care
about when you’re trying to breathe is to get some fresh air, that’s
it. And when you get to the point of when you want to be successful as
bad as you want to breathe, then you’ll be successful.
And I’m here to tell you, number one, that most of you say want to be
successful but you don’t want it bad, you just kind of want it. You
don’t want it badder than you want to party, you don’t want it as much
as you want to be cool, most of you don’t want success as much as you
want to sleep! Some of you love sleep more than you love success. And
I’m here to tell you that if you’re going to be successful you’ve got to
be willing to give up sleep.
You got to be willing to work off of three hours, two hours, of sleep.
If you really want to be successful somedays you’re going to have to
stay up for three days in a row! Because if you go to sleep you might
miss the opportunity to be successful. That’s how bad you have to want
it. You’ve got to want it so bad that somedays you forget to eat.
Beyonce said once, on set, that three days had gone by and she was just
doing her thing, she had forgotten to eat! Because she was engaged with
her work.
When 50 Cent was doing his movie, did a little research, that when he
wasn’t doing his movie, he was doing his soundtrack. And they said,
“When do you sleep 50!?”
“Sleep?!”, he said, “Sleep?! Sleep is for those people who are broke. I
don’t sleep. I got an opportunity to make a dream a reality.”
Don’t try to quit. You’re already in pain, you’re already hurt. Get a reward from it! Don’t go to sleep until you succeed.
You won’t be successful until you say, pointing to self, “I don’t need that money, because I got it in here.
