THREE FEET FROM GOLD

One of the common causes of failure is the habit of quitting when one is overtaken by temporary defeat. Every person is guilty of this mistake at one time or the other.

Many times, I have thought about quitting my music career because I faced many obstacles; different obstacles ranging from lack of support from my parents and husband, unfriendly industry community, sexual harassment, funds, etc.

Sometimes, I would think of going back to my job as an auditor. I know that if I did, I would be miserable for the rest of my life.

I even registered another company asides from Drumline Entertainment to carry out services that I carried out as an auditor so as to make profits and raise funds to support my music business and please my father. I found out that my attention was divided and I was stressed out. 

One day, I just stopped working on that company's business and focused on my creative careers which make me happy. What I would do to get more money is to work hard at these creative activities and get more music and writing gig. I will survive!


So, I kept to my dreams, weighed my options and decided to follow my dreams as a musician and writer.

My husband made me choose between him and my music and I fell into depression and my parents took good care of me. Now, they support my music and writing careers because they see that these are the things I love to do.

You do not have to break down emotionally before you know what you want to do in life and how to achieve it. Also, do not let your loved one get to a point where they are emotionally weighed down because you want them to do a certain career just to please them. Communicate with them and support them.

R.U. Darby, who later became one of the most successful insurance salesmen in America, tells the story of his uncle, who was caught by the gold fever in the gold-rush days and went West to dig and grow rich. 

He had never heard the saying that more gold has been mined from the brains of men that has never been taken from the earth. He staked a claim and went to work with pick and shovel. The going was hard, but his lust for gold was definite.

After weeks of labour, he was rewarded by the discovery of the shinning ore. He needed machinery to bring the ore to the surface. 

Quietly, he covered up the mine, retraced his footsteps to his home in Williamsburg, Maryland and told his relatives and a few neigbours of the strike. They got money for the needed machinery and had it shipped to a smelter.The returns proved they had one of the richest mines in Colrado! A few more cars of that ore would clear the debts. Profit would be made.

Down went the drills! Up went the hopes of Darby and uncle! Then something happened- the vein of gold ore disappeared. They had come to the end of the rainbow and the pot of gold was no longer there. They drilled on desperately trying to pick up the vein again, all to no avail.

Finally, they decided to quit. They sold the machinery to a junk man for a few hundred dollars and took the train back home. Some junk men are dumb, but not this one! He called in a mining engineer to look at the mine and so a little calculating. 

The engineer advised that the project had failed because the owners were not familiar with the fault lines. His calculation revealed that the vein would be found just three feet from where the Darby’s had stopped drilling! That is exactly where it was found.

The junk man took million of dollars in ore from the mine because he was intelligent enough to seek expert advice before giving up. Most of the money which went into the machinery was procured through the efforts of R.U. Darby, who was then a very young man. The money came from his relatives and neighbours and he had to pay back every single penny and this took him many years to do.

Long afterward, Mr. Darby recouped his loss many times over when he made the discovery that desire can be transmuted to gold. This discovery came after he went into the business of selling life insurance.

Remembering that he lost a huge fortune because he stopped three feet from gold, Darby profited from the experience in his chosen work. His simple method was to say to himself, “I stopped three feet from gold but I will never stop because men say NO when I ask them to buy insurance.” He owes his stickability to the lesson he learned from his quickability in the gold mining business. 

Before success comes to most people, they are sure to meet much temporary defeat and perhaps some failure and then quit. Failure is a trickster with a keen sense of irony and cunning. It takes great delight in tripping one up when success is almost within reach.

After reading the story above, I made up my mind to do the things I really love; concentrate on them and be the best I can be at them.

Everyday, I try to move one step further to my destination. I rehearse music on my drums, I compose music, I practice my stage craft in deejaying and dancing and I also make sure that I write everyday.

I am working on my album, writing scripts for my music videos, working towards shooting the videos and working towards the promotion of my music.

Everyday, I move in the direction of my success. I do not let obstacles like lack of power supply, networking, lack of an adequate team, etc stop me. I drive myself forward.

If you are currently working on a project or intend to start your own business or write a book or shoot a movie, do not give excuses on why these things cannot be done. Just do it!

You never know how close you are to success. Never give up on your dreams. I won't!