Winners Never Quit!

At one time, Sylvester Stallone was one of the highest paid actor who demanding a fee of US$20 million or more per movie. Do you think he was lucky? Was he naturally talented actor? Was he at the right place at the right time? The answer is hardly! He was someone who seemed to have all the odds stacked up against him.

His family was so poor until his mother had to give birth to him on the doorsteps of a school. A traumatic forceps delivery caused his facial nerve to be severed, leaving him paralyzed on the lower left side of his face. As a result, he had to live the rest of his life with slurred speech, droopy eye and lazy sneer. Not only that, he also had to deal with those who always taunted him because of his face feature and his name "Sylvester' which associated with the Looney Tunes cat. Despite all these limitations, he still dreamed of becoming an actor and inspiring millions of people through his movies.

He then started looking for job as an actor and going for many auditions. With his limitation at his face feature and slurred speech, he was rejected for more than 1000 times. His wife even told him to give up his "stupid dream" and get a real job. At that point of time, he was so broke until he was forced to sell his dog for $50 because he could not afford to feed his dog and needed the money to survive.

Two weeks later, he went to watch a boxing match between the world heavyweight champion Muhammed Ali and Chuck Wepner, an underdog that everyone thought would be defeated within three rounds. What no one expected was Wepner's determination and tenacity, he lasted the total of 15 rounds with Ali, just refusing to go down. Sylvester Stallone was so inspired by what he saw and he got the inspiration for the film - "Rocky". Instead of continued searching for an acting job, he started writing profusely for 20 straight hours without sleep until he finished the manuscript for 'Rocky'. He was so excited by the script because in his mind he knew that this was going to be the movie that would change his life and his fortune.

He began attempting to sell his script, on the condition that he himself must be the main actor but everyone rejected it. He didn't give up and he kept going. Eventually, he got an offer for $125,000 for his script but did not want him as the actor. Due to this, he walked away from the offer because his dream was to be an actor, not a writer.

The offer price rose to $250,000 and eventually to $325,000, as long as he would not star in the movie. But he still refused.

"Are you insane?", they asked him.
"No, I am Rocky", he responded.

Eventually, they reluctantly agreed, on the condition that the movie was made on a shoe string budget of less than a million dollars and he would only get US$35,000 plus a percentage of profits for the writing and acting. He agreed immediately.

Guess what! Things turned out well for Sylvester Stallone. After he got the money, the first thing he did was to search for the man who bought his dog. He offered the man US$125 and then US$500 for the dog. The man still refused. He ultimately paid $15,000 plus a part in the movie to get his dog back.

The moral of the story is winners never quit and quitters never win.