Never Try Never Know

I submitted my race report Bali Marathon 2015 way back in September 2015 to the Star Newspaper in the hope for publication to share my joy with the Star readers. Unfortunately, my first attempt failed. Since then, I decided to focus on writing for my blog only.

2nd attempt

Somehow, I thought I should try again - and this time it's about the 10 inspirational new year's resolutions for runners. It took me about 2 days to write this article as I'm a rather slow writer. :)

In the back of my head, I was telling myself,

What's the worst thing that could happen? Another rejection? :)

Well, I have faced enough objections and rejections in my life that another rejection will not do any harm to me. haha! In fact, I believe rejections will make me a stronger person, molding me, helping me to learn about lessons in life. And for this case, if at all being rejected again, I still can learn about the reasons why my article contribution is not accepted so that I can continue to improve myself. :)

Hence, I became very thick-skinned and submitted the article on new year's eve (December 31, 2016).

Here is my email to the editor of The Star Newspaper:

Dear Editor,

I would like to submit an article that I wrote about 10 inspirational new year's resolutions for runners. I also included some tips and pointers on how to make it happy. I hope my article will be selected to be shared with The Star readers to inspire the greater running community for a sports-inspired simple, healthy, positive living.

Thank you very much and Happy 2017.

Unexpected response

As days passed by, I didn't receive any reply. So I thought, "Oh well, another failed attempt." And I was already ready to move on and put this behind me.

Unexpectedly, I received a wonderful, inspirational reply from the editor on Jan 5, 2017,

I was in cloud 9. I couldn't believe it. I was so happy that I kept reading editor's reply several times over. I even showed to a few colleagues to verify if I read it correctly. haha! It was such a joy!! A timely motivation for me to continue in this blogging / writing journey.

On the same evening, the editor called my mobile to check if I have received the email and whether I could provide the pictures by lunch time the next day.

As I was talking to the editor on the phone, I couldn't withhold back my joy! I thanked him profusely for this opportunity of my lifetime, telling him how much motivation it's to me.

He is such a nice chap! I am so grateful to him.

Before the publication, he even texted me informing me that he had to edit some of it as well as to shorten it to fit the page. I was like, "hey editor, do whatever you want to it! Even if only a paragraph is published, I am happy." :)

And with God's blessings and editor's kindness, my first English article was then published on 10 January 2017 in The Star Newspaper's Outdoors section. Rather than 10 new year's resolutions for runners, it was reduced down to 7. No complaints at all from me. I was just really overwhelmed by it. I am so old already, yet it made me feel as if I was still in high school time scoring my first As. lol!

I also thank those who really support and encourage me to press on to use a pen to inspire others.

Truly, I am speechless and overjoyed.

I promise I will continue to write using my experience to inspire, encourage others.

This will go down as a milestone in my life.