The part of the story we never really hear about

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I love stories. I love successful stories with fairy tale endings even more. The funny thing is i'm not the mushy emotional kinda girl but hey...I still like happy stories, because who doesn't, right? Who doesn't want the insignificant person to end up being president? Who doesn't want someone who's fought hard against all odds to end up winning? Well...maybe the fans of Game of thrones......(*Side eye*) Why do I love stories? Stories resonate with me when I can see myself in a particular character or when I feel emotionally connected to the premise of the story. This is one of the reasons I love Grey's anatomy or The Good wife or Madam Secretary or Downton Abbbey or 24 or Prison Break or Suits ... You probably think you've got me figured out based on my choice of TV series Well, I actually loved Breaking bad. A strange choice, yeah? Ok, back to my post before I get carried away. Story telling is a global phenomenon. We all love to read or hear stories because deep down we connect to these stories in some way either because they motivate us, make us think or just make us laugh However, there's one thing about stories I don't like, especially if they are real stories; I always feel like events that took months or years to happen get summarized into a short paragraph or a 15 min speech. They provide an abridged version at best. A good example is the Bill Gates story. He has a fantastic story. From college dropout to tech mogul to billionaire philanthropist I love the excerpts of his story on how he happened to go to a school where there was a computer club and so he got to build his genius computing skills pretty early. How he told the folks at IBM about his great idea to make computers accessible to everyone on the planet and his idea got rejected and so, he resigned and went on to start Microsoft, which has in some way contributed to making him top the Forbes list of the world's billionaires 17 times in 22 years. Yeah, Fantastic story. However, I wonder sometimes, what if he hadn't put in the work to build his skills when he gained access to a computer? What if he hadn't taken the risk to actually go through with his 'crazy idea' that some smart CEO turned down? I ask myself the 'what if' question when I get tired and just want to throw in the towel. When I feel like I've given it my all and there's nothing left to give. This is the part of the story we don't hear too often. What kept people like Bill Gates going? What made them hold on? Did they know they would be that successful? or did they just choose to believe against all odds? I wish I had the answers from Bill himself But, the truth is he just did it. He stayed disciplined with building his skills at a young age. He stepped out to create a company based on an idea no one believed in IBM. Yeah, it's that simple. He stepped out, started and stayed consistent. He decided to go for it, against all odds and somehow, it worked out. The truth remains, you'll never know until you do it. Sure, get all the advice you can. Attend every start-up meet-up. Read all the books till you can recite them in your dreams. But you know what? You'll still never know until you do it. Stop looking for a magic wand. Just get started even if its in a small way and if you've started already. That's fantastic. Keep going. The sheer courage required to stay committed to making it work is the part of the story we never really hear about. It's the rocky unsteady part but that's the part you'll look back at and cherish. The successful part of the story which the public gets to see and hear in a summarized speech or paragraph is the result you get when you get through this tough part. Stay strong ., You've got this.