4 Stories of Resilience That Will Inspire You to Keep Going
Resiliency — the ability to pick yourself back up again after you face a tragedy, a trauma, or a huge change or difficulty in your life — is a trait that many of us respect and wish we had.
You might feel that, if something bad happened to you, you’d never be able to recover.
If you lost a limb, for example, you’re certain that you’d shut down and become dependent on others for assistance with daily tasks. If your relationship ended, you would feel like your life was over.
It’s normal to wonder whether or not you’d be able to keep going at all, let alone have the quality of life you once had.
Keep on reading these stories of resilience to get inspired.
1. Stephen King’s Story
You likely know Stephen King as the famous author of books like It, The Shining, and many more horror novels that have been turned into epic films.
However, his life wasn’t always so easy, making his current and continued career success one of our favorite stories of resiliency.
Many people don’t know that he actually grew up in a trailer. At one time, he had to give up his telephone because he couldn’t afford it.
He also received over 50 rejection letters for his writing, meaning that he had no way to keep his family afloat.
Even after his career took off, he faced severe alcohol and drug addiction. He has stated in past interviews that often, he was so high and drunk that he wasn’t even aware of what he was writing.
He nearly lost his family, career, and his fame — in short, everything that he had worked for.
Yet, in spite of everything, King is clean and sober today.
He is also one of the most commercially successful writers of all time.
2. A Miracle Baby
Many of us can’t imagine what our lives would be like after losing the person we love the most in the world.
But that’s exactly what happened to a woman named Kristen Tripson.
Her husband passed away from lymphoma in 2016, but before his death, the couple had decided to freeze embryos.
They weren’t sure if Sam would make it or not, and they wanted to ensure that, one way or another, they had the chance to bring another child into this world.
A few weeks after her husband had passed away, she discovered that she was pregnant with his child.
Their daughter is a happy and healthy reminder of the love the two of them shared — and an incredible reason to keep going.
3. The Resilient Surfer
Many people feel that, if they lost the ability to do the things that they loved, their lives would feel meaningless.
At just 13 years old, a young surfer named Bethany Hamilton was faced with the possibility of having to give up on her dreams of being a professional surfer and record-breaker.
When she was out on the waves in Kauai, she was the victim of a brutal shark attack and lost her left arm. The shark attack as so vicious that it even ended up taking a huge chunk out of her surfboard.
Many people, even including her family, assumed that she would never surf again.
She got back in the water only one month after the attack.
Oh, and by the way, she is now a professional surfer.
In fact, Hamilton’s life story has become so famous that it’s been the subject of films, movies, and numerous TV shows. It’s one of the best stories about resilience of all time.
4. The Entrepreneur
We all deal with the fear of failure in our professional lives.
Maybe you didn’t get the job of your dreams. Maybe an employee that you feel is far less qualified than you got the promotion you were interested in.
Or perhaps you just feel that your career is stuck in neutral, and that you’ll never be able to do what you love.
Brian Acton once felt the same way.
He was a software engineer with a serious skill set. Yet, he couldn’t get his foot in the door. Even with all the right experience — at both Yahoo and even Apple — nobody wanted to hire him.
Twitter and Facebook told him that he wasn’t good enough to work for them.
One day, he decided to follow his own path, making this one of the top stories of resilience in regards to one’s professional life.
He decided to work with another former Yahoo employee to develop a messaging system. Perhaps you’ve heard of it — Whatsapp.
Years later, Facebook, the company that once turned him down, bought Whatsapp from Acton.
So, how much did they pay for it?
Close to $19 billion.
Feeling Inspired by These Stories of Resilience?
From the surfer who lost an arm to a shark and got back in the water a month later to the writer who overcame poverty and rejection, we hope you feel inspired by these stories of resilience.
Remember that, no matter what you’re currently facing and no matter how impossible things might seem, your life will get better.
You just have to give yourself the opportunity to surprise yourself.
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Be sure to keep checking back with us to learn more about how you can live your life to the fullest — every single day.