How to become highly successful and prove your doubters wrong
Use the bank holiday rest to turbo charge your career ambitions and refocus. Josephine Fairley offers some top tips on how to deal with these inevitable put-downs
A friend shared a video on Facebook the other day, which - as we shuffle back to work after a blissfully long weekend off - got me thinking about the power of the put-down. Misty Copeland, soloist with the American Ballet Theatre, didn't take up ballet till she was 13 (positively geriatric in ballet terms) - and many times was told her physique didn't 'fit'.
Strong, muscular and powerful, she's the absolute antithesis of the light-as-a-dandelion-clock ballet dancer we generally see (and in my case, want to hand a pack of biscuits to). I think she's all the more beautiful for that, but the real message of Misty's success is that it's possible to overcome the naysayers - and go on to become highly successful.
Media billlionaire Oprah Winfrey, after a tough and abusive childhood, was told she was 'unfit for TV'. Little Women author Louisa May Alcott was encouraged by her family to take work as a servant, to make ends meet. Marilyn Monroe was advised to become a secretary. And personally, I've always loved MGM's comment on Fred Astaire's first screen test: 'Can't act. Can't sing. Slightly bald. Can dance a little.'