What experiences in life helped you grow the most?

As a child I was always put down. Partly my own fault, I wasn’t the best of children, I was generally not well behaved and an attention seeker.

My birth mother died when I was four days old and I was taken in, (kidnapped), by an aunt. I was relocated to London and subsequently adopted without my birth father’s knowledge or consent.

I never really felt loved as a son by my adoptive mother, I’m not saying I wasn’t loved, but I always felt like and also ran. She had recently had a stillbirth, and I felt like the inadequate and inferior replacement for that lost baby. But, hey-ho, I survived and I thrived.

All through school, despite being bright, I was put down by the teachers. One even wrote in my report, “he will sweep roads all his life and aspire to be a dustman’ not the most affirmative statement.

At the end of the day, I qualified as an engineer, went on to become a director of an engineering company and eventually had my own business.

I now believe that all the put downs by adults actually helped in my success. I was determined to prove to me, not them, I no longer wanted or needed their affermation, that I could do it. So I did.

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Please note this blog is written in British English because I am British and we invented the language!

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© Richard J Kirk, writing as Joseph R Mason – 2025
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