How Abraham Lincoln Inspired Me to Pursue My Ph.D.?

Abraham Lincoln has always been one of my most venerated heroes since my school days and I always keep a photo of him on my study table to remind myself to study hard like him. Americans venerate him as their most beloved President but I venerate him because he is one of my greatest sources of inspiration and motivation throughout my educational journey. This was especially true during those days when I failed to secure a place in a public university and my mom was dying of cancer (It should be noted that during those days, if you were rejected by the public universities and had no money to study overseas, you would be considered as 'no good'). Those were really hard times and I had no choice but to work as a temporary teacher in order to fund my education. Being influenced by Abraham Lincoln, I decided to take up University of London's external LL.B. Program with the intention to continue with the LL.M. followed by the LL.D.. At that time, my ambition was to be a law lecturer in a public university since I love teaching and research. Life was tough as I had to work and study at the same time and there was little or almost no time for enjoyment. Further, my mom was very sick and needed attention. My relatives and friends suggested that I should take the easy way out - enter Teachers' Training College, become a primary school teacher (during those days primary school teachers only had a diploma in teaching and were underpaid), get married and live happily ever after. Life could be as simple as that - if I could give up the whole idea about tertiary education then I would have no problems at all. However, I preferred the hard way out because I did not want to live a mediocre life. Although I knew that it was not easy to pass the LL.B. Examinations, I decided to give it a try because of what Lincoln said, "If you are resolutely determined to make a lawyer of yourself, the thing is more than half done already... Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other thing." How did I know that he said this?

Thanks to Dale Carnegie's How to Develop Self-Confidence and Influence People by Public Speaking, I got to know a lot about Abraham Lincoln's life and developed a very strong desire to emulate him since my student days. I did not read this book to learn about public speaking - I was just reading the book for fun when I came across so much information about this ambitious, hardworking, studious, self-taught and self-made young man. This book has since become one of my greatest sources of inspiration because I could find the life of Lincoln in it. I have read it countless times in my life whenever I was feeling down and felt like giving up with my studies. When the chance to enter university was gone, the only thing I could do was to hang on to the great inspirational life story of Abraham Lincoln in the hope that one day I would be able to get the Ph.D. that I have been dreaming of.

What then was so special about Abraham Lincoln? The story of his perseverance and determination to educate himself despite his turbulent childhood and difficult background was really inspiring. Lincoln, in his youth, attended school in a primitive log cabin. Known as the "blab school", there was only one copy of the textbook and the teacher read from it aloud. The children were required to repeat the lesson after him, all of them talking together at once thus keeping the classroom in constant uproar. Despite the enormous obstacles facing him, he was not deterred from seeking education. While other boys were busy hooking watermelons and wasting time, Lincoln was busy reading, thinking and reflecting. His stepmother remembered that "he must understand everything - even to the smallest thing - minutely and exactly. He would then repeat it over to himself again and again - sometimes in one form and then in another and when it was fixed in his mind to suit him he... never lost that fact or his understanding of it (Donald, p. 29)."

Throughout his entire life, he had only attended school less than twelve months because he had to work to supplement his family's income. And who taught him? Zachariah Birney and Caleb Hazel in the forests of Kentucky, Azel Dorsey and Andrew Crawford along Little Pigeon Creek in Indiana - scarcely educated teachers who traveled from one place to another, eking out a meager existence, teaching those who could afford to pay in cash or in commodities. No qualification was required of them beyond the Rules of three, namely, readin, writin, and cipherin. No doubt, there was little assistance and inspiration that Lincoln could get from his transient and untrained teachers as well as his daily environment. Although his intermittent formal schooling ended when he was fifteen, that did not prevent him from acquiring education. Lincoln was a voracious reader who read all the books he could lay his hands on and had walked  to borrow every book within fifty miles of his home. He worked on his father's farm in the day and spent his nights reading by the light of the fireplace. He also had the habit of carrying a book with him to the farm and read whenever he had the time. In the words of Professor Emerton, "He was no longer at school, but was simply educating himself by the only pedagogical method which ever yet produced any results anywhere, namely, by the method of his own tireless energy in continuous study and practice (Carnegie, p. 237)."

And who were Abraham Lincoln's parents? His father was a shiftless, illiterate carpenter and his mother was a woman of no extraordinary achievements. Growing up in abject poverty, Lincoln's teen years were spent in constant toil as he had to earn money through hard labor. When he was seventeen, he together with Dennis Hanks and Squire Hall, set themselves up as sawyers, selling firewood to steamboats plying the Ohio River. When their plan failed, he built a little flatboat to ferry passengers to passing boats. When he was not working on the river, he plowed, butchered hogs and made fences. In 1828, at the age of 19, Lincoln took his first trip down the Mississippi when he accompanied a local store owner's son to send a cargo of meat and grain for sale in New Orleans on the flatboat. His wage was $8 a month and board.

A painting of the young Lincoln by Norman Rockwell

Lincoln once told John Locke Scripps of the Chicago Tribune that the story of his early life could be condensed into one sentence in Thomas Gray's famous Elegy: "The short and simple annals of the poor." Learning by littles (a week here, a month there), he has always considered his education to be "defective".  However, despite the defects in his education, his Gettysburg Address is known to be the greatest speech in the world. Needless to say, his love of learning, his determination to improve his mind, and his stunning work of self-education had brought him success. What lessons have I learnt from the story of Lincoln's life? This motivational story had inspired me to study even harder and follow my dreams. I deeply admired him and fervently wanted to emulate his way - never give up in the face of adversity until the goal is reached.

Reading about Lincoln's life greatly inspired me because I was more or less in the same situation as him (humble origins, read a lot, worked and studied hard at the same time). He was my perfect idol at the time I needed some encouragement to keep going and it was in him that I found the impetus to succeed despite the obstacles in my life. Although I had to give up my law studies and entered Teachers' Training College after my mom passed away (because I needed money to survive), I have never given up studying (part time) until I have completed my Ph.D. program. After leaving the Teachers' Training College, I immediately continued my studies in law. I was already doing my final year when I was offered a place at UPM (Universiti Putra Malaysia) to do a bachelor degree in TESL. Being super ambitious, I decided to kill two birds with one stone but the problem was that working and taking up two university courses at the same left me with very little time for myself. I was so busy that I had no time to eat. In the end, I decided to give up my law studies because my ultimate purpose was to pursue a Ph.D. and it did not matter which course I was doing. I started my MA program right after my Bachelors graduation. After having completed my MA in English literature, there was a time when I wondered whether I should proceed with the Ph.D. program because this would mean that I would not have any time for myself at all and I did not want to suffer again like what I did during my MA program. Since I came back from Medjugorje, I have been taking part in Medjugorje's Evening Prayer Programme online every night. Further, the thought of having no enjoyment apart from working and studying was not a pleasant one. But thoughts of Lincoln made me put aside everything to focus on my Ph.D. because he was a constant reminder that I should make my dream a reality no matter how difficult life might turn out to be. Yes, I have always wanted a Ph.D. and it must be done.

When I was doing my Ph.D. program, a sudden and unexpected change took place in my life. I became a lecturer in an institution of higher learning in Pahang. Life was tough as I had to start afresh in another state with a different job and waste a lot of time traveling to and from Kuala Lumpur every weekend. What made matters worse was, at that time, there was no water supply most of the time in my quarters - I had to wake up a few times every night to check if the water supply had been temporarily restored and collect as much water as I could. The water supply normally lasted from 2.00 or 3.00 a.m. until 5.00 or 6.00 a.m. Sometimes, the water supply was only restored for a short while and if I were to oversleep, I wouldn't be able to collect any water at all. Sometimes there was no water for 2-3 days. There were times when there was not even a drop of water for more than ten days (the longest was 2 weeks). As I had to wake up several times in the wee hours of the morning to collect water, I ended up not having enough sleep. I also had to take my clothes back to Kuala Lumpur to wash every weekend.

Being a lecturer in Pahang was indeed challenging. I had very little time to write my Ph.D. thesis - I worked from 8.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m. from Mondays to Fridays and had to travel to and from Kuala Lumpur during the weekends. When I was a teacher, I only worked half day and so I had to try to get used to the longer working hours of a lecturer. I also had to spend a lot of time preparing for my lessons because I was teaching the subjects that I have never taught before. Replacement classes were common and sometimes I had to teach until 10.00 p.m. Going back to my quarters after a hard day's work only to find that there was no water really made me feel like crying. It was what I have read about Abraham Lincoln that gave me the courage and strength to keep going. If he did not give up, why should I? Well, the greatest courage is to smile through tears.

According to Theodore Roosevelt, "Often when I had some matter to decide, something involved and difficult to dispose of, something where there were conflicting rights and interests, I would look up at Lincoln, try to imagine him in my place, try to figure out what he would do in the same circumstances. It may sound odd to you, but, frankly, it seemed to make my troubles easier of solution (Carnegie, p. 102)." Similarly, whenever I felt discouraged or felt like giving up the fight, I asked myself what Lincoln would do if he were in my position and I knew that I have found the answer. I said to myself, "I don't have to carry an ax and I don't have to work on a river - I'm only doing sedentary work. There is proper lighting in my quarters and I have a proper bed - I'm certainly in a much more favorable situation compared to Abraham Lincoln's younger days, so what's the problem? And time, it can be made." And I persevered knowing that those hard times would come to pass.

Working everlastingly and persistently, at last I managed to complete my Ph.D. thesis after about 4 years of part time study. (I enrolled for my Ph.D. program in February 2012 and submitted my thesis in July 2016). As I look back on my life, all I can say is, "Well, the tears shed and inconvenience suffered during my educational journey are what we call life. They have already come to pass. Whether I have been doing anything or not, the time will pass anyway, so why not suffer a bit and get the Ph.D. first? It's well worth it." I am now free to join the Medjugorje Evening Prayer Programme online every night and need not worry about having no time for enjoyment anymore! 

Here I would like to quote a verse from the poem entitled 'Good Timber' by Douglas Malloch:

Good timber does not grow with ease:
The stronger wind, the stronger trees;
The further sky, the greater length;
The more the storm, the more the strength.
By sun and cold, by rain and snow,
In trees and men good timbers grow.

How right he is. I find that I am a much stronger person now because I have survived the hard times. The lesson here is - if you keep moving towards your dreams, you will eventually get to the finish line.

You may also like to read Footprints in the Sand, Salutation to the Dawn, and How to Leave the Past Behind You and Move Forward. To view the content page of this blog, please click here.


References:
1.  Carnegie, Dale. How to Develop Self-Confidence and Influence People by Public Speaking.
2.  Abraham Lincoln: An Illustrated History of His Life and Times. Time Inc.
3.  Donald, David Herbert. (1995). Lincoln. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.
4.  Blumenthal, Sidney. (2016). A Self-Made Man: The Political Life of Abraham Lincoln 1809-1849. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.