Chris Gardner Biography – Poor to Rich Journey
There is a very apt quote from bill gates that says
” if you’re born poor it is not your mistake but if you die poor it is your mistake”
Right vision continuous hard work and self-belief can help us achieve our aim for life there are a number of people with inspiring stories of how they employed every ounce of their hard work and achieved something which seemed impossible in the beginning in today’s ARTICLE we are going to enlighten you with the success story of Chris Gardner who is the founder of Gardner and rich firm so let’s get started.
LIFE
There was a time in Chris Gardner’s life when he was too poor to afford a proper living for himself he had to stay in places like public toilets and metro stations due to the absence of proper shelter not only this he had spent countless nights n parks and churches as well let’s go back in time and discuss his childhood well Chris Gardner had a rough childhood to start with his step-father was a violent alcoholic who used to beat his mother and didn’t behave well with the rest of the family also so Chris was brought up by his mother who made a great impression on his life as well, it was her teachings like the necessity of self-belief to achieve anything in life that acted as the motivating factor for Chris one fine day at the age of 16 Chris was watching a football match on his tv during match watching the performance of two fine players the commentator said that these two players are going to become big players in the future well Chris was quick to commend that one of the players will become a millionaire while all this was going on Chris’s mother was sitting right beside him on hearing this his mother responded with a statement that became wisdom words for Chris she said.
” if you want then you can also become a millionaire one day “
These words stayed with Chris forever and helped him in his later life once he completed school he joined the U.S Navy and served for four years after that he decided to make a career in medicine and moved to San Francisco for the same it was like an opportunity was waiting for him there Chris was offered the position of assistant by well-known doctor Robert Ellis so from 1974 he started to work as an assistant in dr Robert Ellis lab his work ranged from helping to maintain the research lab to assisting the doctor in various research projects, unfortunately, the salary he got there did not cover his and his family’s expenses so he decided to leave it and tried his hand in the sale of medical equipment but his struggles continued as this job also did not provide him with sufficient money that would take care of his family’s needs during this phase.
LIFE CHANGING MOMENTS
One day he saw a man parking his ferrari by the roadside chris walked up to the owner of that car and started to have a conversation with him he asked the man what he did and how he was able to afford that luxurious car the man simply replied that i am a stock broker chris was left wondering as he was unaware of the term stock broker this intrigued him and he asked that man more about his work of stock brokering to this the man replied that he would discuss it with chris some other day chris got curious about it so he arranged a meeting with that man in the meeting the man patiently explained each and everything related to stock brokering in detail that person was mr bob bridges who held a good position in a stock brokering firmwell it was after this meeting that chris finally realized that this field was his passion after the meeting he requested bob to refer him for an internshipat a stock brokerage firm bob agreed to his request and referred him to the DWR brokerage firm chris was very happy after this but life can offer you unwanted challenges few days before his internship interview chris was arrested for not paying parking tickets and he was put in jail so on the day of his interview he had to go directly to the firm in the same clothes he went to jail in despite being not so well dressed he got selected for the internship in dwr due to his passion and enthusiasm now the salary he got as an intern in dwr was a small amount he also had to sell medical equipment to earn more but it was not sufficient and his family’s condition deteriorated further he was left with no money to pay rent for his house thus he ended up being homeless and had to sleep at random places wherever he got some space he had his two-year-old son who was with him during this time they often had to spend their nights in public toilets on some days the condition would be so bad that he couldn’t afford a meal.
NO JOB
On a certain occasion he had to donate his blood to make some money and buy food for his son and himself nobody in the office was aware that Chris often used to sleep inside it at night after dropping his son at daycare he would work hard the entire day during nights after picking his son from daycare he used to find places where he could sleep with his little kid by his side this was because his salary allowed him to afford either food or house and any sane person would go with food even after facing such hardships and personal life he did his work with pure dedication and became one of the top trainees of DWR, as a result, he was given a full-time job in the same firm his earnings got better and he was then able to afford a rented house after working as one of the ace employees in DWR he bagged a job at beer stones and then there was no looking back again he performed very well at beer stones so much so that in 1987 he went on to open his own investment firm by the name gardner-richcompany he used his surname and the surname of a popular hedge fund manager mr mark rich mr mark rich had no contribution in the firm but as a token of honor chris used his surnamein his company’s name you must be wondering what gardner rich does as a firm well it’s an institutional brokerage firm that works as a broker for big institutions such as pension funds soon after its launch the company started to perform well and at the age of 34 he went on to become a millionaire on certain occasions chris gardner has often called himself lucky because he landed a job he was passionate about if we talk about the present net worth of chris gardner then it accounts to nearly 70 million dollars and guess what now he motivates people from all around the world his struggles were big and roadblocks were countless yet he surpassed them all to become so successful this is why he tries his best to motivate people with his life story and help them to come out of any path-blocking situation in life apart from being a motivational speaker he is also an active philanthropist and has provided financial aid to a number of charitable organizations one such organization is glide memorial united methodist church.
HARD WORK
His connection with this organization is old and he has an emotional story associated with it during his struggling days one night he had nowhere to go he came across this organization but Glyde memorial united methodist church only allowed women to stay for shelter at the polite request of Chris Gardner the organization agreed to make an exception for him and his son and allowed them to stay for that night thus once he had enough money he donated funds to the same church he actively donates funds to organizations which provide accommodations for the homeless and those who work towards protecting women from violence these causes are very close to his heart he’s seen extreme low points in his life despite this his high risk-taking capacity is phenomenal and something which teaches us a lot, Chris Gardner never gave into situations that were extremely difficult and all these qualities made him a self-made billionaire summing up the struggle and his life journey he has also penned down an autobiography by the name pursuit of happiness which has also been made into a Hollywood movie starring will smith the story of this man is very inspiring for everyone and you can recommend this article to those who don’t know about Chris Gardner’s life story hope you like the ARTICLE.
SOME IMPORTANT LINKS:-
Warren Buffett Age, Stock Shares – Biography
Comments are closed.