Do The Mike Thing

Jugglie

I missed more than 9000 shots in my career.

I've lost almost 300 games.

26 times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot.

I've failed over and over and over in my life.

That is why I succeed.

These are the words that pretty much changed my life.

For the past 8 years I have watched this video almost every single day, and every time I watch it, it reaffirms why Michael Jordan has inspired me for almost 20 years.

I don't speak about it much but for a period of my life I felt like the biggest failure I knew.
I never felt I was a failure in the fullest sense of the word, but I was always second best.

I was good at almost every sport I tried but never the best.

I excelled at almost anything I tried but always came up that one step short of someone else who tried the exact same thing as me.

It was not until 1999 that I embarked on the one endeavour that I feel for the first time I have not been a failure in.

I started working in the Athletic Shoe market e" I had a passion for basketball and had worn Jordan's and many other models in the past but when I started working in the footwear industry my love for the product exploded. Did I collect each and every shoe I could along the way? NO, Do I regret it? NO for me it is being able to be a part of the industry.

I have had the opportunity to purchase at least 40-50 Jordan's that have past through stores I have worked in, and I have a handful but not what others in my position would. At times I even forwent purchasing a pair so customers could purchase them, some people would scoff at that thought but it was about spreading the passion to everyone, clichÃf© I know.

In the past 8 years I have overlooked a degree I finished, and worked from the retail gutter towards my goal. The industry has even blessed me with the opportunity to travel over seas spreading my passion, everyone I know knows me as the shoe guy, from here in Australia, to London, England where I lived to the US and Europe where I travelled.

And now it has landed me in my current role of educating people on sneakers, I have succeeded in my passion. My dreams have become reality.
I am sitting here at my desk I look around at various Jordan books and images and a pair tiny Jordan 1's which always bring it home for me where I want to be, Am I crazy? Maybe but for the first time in my life I have succeeded and I can put it down to Michael Jordan, his legacy, his skill, his motivation, his shoes, his dream.

He mad me believe I could succeed and he made me believe I could fly.

Thanks Michael.