Words Of Wisdom From:
John D. Rockefeller - The Richest Man Who Ever Lived
From a very modest background, John Rockefeller started off life by selling potatoes and other goods door to door whilst he was still a child, before earning enough money for himself to study book keeping. His father was a poor travelling salesman, with a reputation for cheating and treating people badly, including his own family, as he married another woman whilst still married to Rockefeller's mother.
John's mother taught him Christian values that shaped his life. She often quoted words from a sermon by John Wesley that Rockefeeler later referred to as the motto for his life - "Gain all you can. Save all you can. Give all you can." So, when he started selling door to door as a child, he tried to earn as much as he could from his time selling. He gave some of the money to his mother to help keep a roof over his family's head and food on the table, whilst he saved the rest for his future education.
He went on to make his fortune in oil and industry. He was worth a reputed $663billion in today's money. That's roughly seven times the net worth of Microsoft's Bill Gates! He went on to gift the majority of his monies to medical research, education and charitable Christian causes.
Every highly successful person can be described as being highly motivated. There are four things that Rockefeller believed motivated him to achieve his levels of success:
1. His Christian faith.
2. His desire to get out of poverty.
3. His determination to be a better man than his father.
4. His hopes to live a life worth living and make the world a better place.
As a man who has achieved great things with his life, not least the fact that he massed more wealth than anyone who has ever lived, then gave most of it away to make the world a better place, here are my top ten words of wisdom that he has left to help us achieve greater success in our lives:
"Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one's aim."
"I do not think there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as to the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything."
"If your only goal is to become rich, you will never achieve it."
"Good leadership consists of showing average people how to do the work of superior people."
"If you want to succeed, you should strike out on new paths, rather than travel the worn paths of accepted success."
"It is wrong to assume that people of immense wealth are always happy."
"I always tried to turn every disaster into an opportunity."
"I believe that thrift is essential to well ordered living."
"There is nothing in this world that can compare with the Christian fellowship; Nothing that can satisfy but Christ."
"We are never too old to study the bible. Each time the lessons are studied comes some new meaning, some new thought which will make us better."
You can learn more about the story of John D. Rockefeller's life, his incredible journey of success and what we can learn from him in my book, Have Confidence, Have Success. You can buy this book on this website and start to apply some of Rockefeller's principles into your life today. Click this link here.