Today’s story is about Gene, one of the accountants in the accounting firm that handles my companies bookkeeping …This is his story, as he recounted over lunch...First off let me give you some background, Gene is from Haiti and came from a background of poverty raised on a farm area by his uncle, he did not attend school till the age of 11 because his family could not afford the 32 goundes (haitain money) which is the equivalent of .80 cents to enroll and go to a catholic private school which was the only one available in the area…. My first question was “What made you want to go to school at age 11 when most of the children in your area did not go?” His reply,” I knew I wanted more out of my life and I knew had to go to school and learn, to be able to achieve this”…. Now here is where the story gets really interesting folks as he proceeded to explain, Gene decided to earn the money by helping with the local farmers and his uncle raising horses, to pay his own way so he could attend school….. Not only did he do this but the school was 2 hours away from where he lived and as he recalled he said “sometimes I did not even have shoes to walk to school because I had only enough for school “ he added “my school book bag was a plastic bag from the grocery store”…… and yes, Gene’s story gets tougher than that people… because Gene had no academic background Gene had to start at preschool at the age of 11…yes while the rest of the class was 4 and 5 years old he was there learning with them…. I asked, “Was it difficult and did you get ridiculed for being the oldest in the class?” His reply, “In the beginning yes, but it was my goal to succeed so it did not matter what others said or thought, I was not going to lose the opportunity to be in school.”… He went on to say ”As the school year progressed I was soon looked upon as the father of the class by the other children so I helped teach, which helped me learn more”…...Now remember folks, this happening while supporting his school payments by working on the farms and raising horses for his uncle and walking 2 hours to and 2 hours back from school and still finding time to study…. He did this till he graduated high school at age 24 then went straight to college earning his accounting degree 4 years later then moving to the US to be a part of this accounting firm…. Now at age 38 with his wife he finds his life to be blessed every minute for he knows the choices that he had to make just to get to this point and who he is today. So here are 4 valuable lessons for today my friends 1. . If you have a dream there is no time limit on when to start or when you will obtain it …the most important is to start today where and in what time of your life you are now. 2. Going after your dream/goal will not be easy and you will be tested, there will be hardships and possibly you will be ridiculed by those who do not understand… ignore them… and focus on who you want to be in your future life and what you want to have … you are worth the journey. 3. Do not dwell on the past problems of who you have been and what you had, if you chose to become more then focus on your future vision and do what it takes right now “today” so you may arrive there in your “better tomorrow”. 4. Stop making excuses… there are people with far less opportunities doing far more things , it is your choice to create your excuses or create the answers.