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Summary Of If By Rudyard Rippling

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“If”, by Rudyard Kipling is a great poem to acquire inspiration from. It is basically a step by step guide on how to survive in the world and succeed. I quite literally take this poem to be based on one common factor, which is success. The whole gist of the poem is one must keep a narrowed focus, avoid dishonesty and hate, risk everything just to lose it, but be willing to start over again. A successful person must watch everything they have dedicated themselves to, get destroyed, but get up and rebuild it. The successful also have to be sure to handle success and failure with grace. If they can do all this, Kipling states, “they will be a man, and will have the world and everything in it.” In the first stanza Kipling says, “If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too.”. In laymen terms I think this can be taken as, if one can keep their mind when everyone else is losing theirs, if one trusts their self and ignores the naysayers, but prepares their self for the struggle of doing something even though everyone says its impossible. The first stanza finishes with Kipling saying, “dont deal in lies”, “dont give way to hate”, “don’t look too good”, “nor talk too wise”, these points alone are enough for someone to live life by. All of these points Kipling makes can be understood as don’t stoop to someones level, however, don’t ever think you are

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