Yusuf Moses: Persistance To A Motivated Life

This is the story of my friend Yusuf Moses, one of the most motivated people I’ve ever met. After years of ups and downs, he is now a respected ABET teacher, happily married father of two daughters. When we first met, he worked in a factory building components for Volkswagen South Africa:

Uitenhage, in the Eastern Cape, not very far from Port Elizabeth, is a place I call home. My name is Yusuf Moses, and I am the eldest of four children. My mother is a soft, understanding, loving, yet strong woman. She has been a housewife for as long as I can remember. My dad is a proud man, a bricklayer by profession. He was always motivated to improve our situation. So he sold items such as peanuts, oranges, sweets and anything he could get his hands on from the age of 10 when his father passed away.

 

Growing up, we were not wealthy in any way. Besides that, we never went to bed hungry, we stuck together, worked hard, never begged and were always honest. My teacher taught us the importance of books and religion as well as what was considered ethical and moral. My dad worked long hours and would come home very tired. He bought items and would force me to help him sell, “We are poor but we are not going to ask or accept any handouts, we are not a charity case,” he used to say. God help those who help themselves, and with those words, without any further discussion, he motivated me to also go out and sell for my family.

 

I wasn’t always motivated because I felt uncomfortable in the early days. It felt like begging to me, walking through town or any other place where I could find a crowd. The taxi rank was the best place, there were always interested and interesting people who made it worth it, and I did not have to walk too far to get it all sold. So, free weekends and playing after school were not part of my childhood. The only thing worse than selling was Monday morning at school, because that was when all the kids who saw me and poked fun at me would start again. Most of the time,e there was nowhere to run or hide. I have been called so many different names, one could probably write a book on that. All this influenced my selling on weekends, but as I was selling.

 

Eventually, I started seeing and realising things that I don’t think I would have noticed if I had not sold. I found that not everyone is what they would pretend to be or say who they are; people will, in most instances, try to bargain with you and pay less than what you were offering. In the end, I learned the most valuable skill for anyone who lacks motivation, i.e. persistence. My exploits on weekends were training wheels for adult life. Selling eventually became a passion, and I’ve since read many books on sales that continue to motivate me.