Cristiano Ronaldo Almost Never Existed – Here’s Why

A note to young leaders.

When life leads you to unexpected or unwanted places – trust it. Its intent is to help you, not to harm you.

Cristiano Ronaldo – the all-time leading international goal-scorer in men’s football – very nearly never was.

When his mother found out amid crushing poverty that she was pregnant a fourth time – and with his father unemployed and an alcoholic – she asked the doctor for an abortion. He refused.

So she tried to end the pregnancy herself using a remedy a friend swore would work: “I drank hot beer and ran until I passed out” – repeating the attempt at least once, without success.

Decades later, his mother would tell the story herself, in her own memoir, and with her son’s blessing. Ronaldo, to his credit, never let the story become a wound. He turned it into affectionate ribbing with his mother: “You didn’t want me to be born. But now look, I’m here helping you all.”

His mother too came to understand it not as a story of guilt, but of grace: “God didn’t want the abortion to happen, and I was blessed because of that – God didn’t punish me.”

Never, ever lose hope.

The unwanted child you feared might impoverish you, may one day become a world champion who enriches you beyond your wildest dreams.

Once in a lifetime, comes the longed-for tidal wave that carries us to otherwise unreachable shores.