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Oprah Winfrey's Ambition

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Ambition is defined as the strong desire to achieve a specific goal and is often driven by determination. It can guide people to achieve goals and aspirations, and some are willingly to do anything in order to satisfy their ambitious personalities. The French military and political Napoleon Bonaparte successfully defined what ambition truly is by stating, “Great ambition is the passion of a great character. Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts. All depends on the principles which direct them.” In other words, ambition is not only aspirations that will help people strive to their successes, but it can also fuel a dangerous desire that people will manipulate and use toward ruthless acts. The desire to achieve has proven …show more content…

Oprah Winfrey, for one, grew up in an abusive household where male relatives of hers would repeatedly molest her, which took an emotional toll on Oprah. She was an unsettled teenager who appeared to have no future ahead of her, considering the cruelty and harm she had undergone. After Oprah moved to Nashville to live with her father, where she could have easily been absorbed in the same life style she perused in New York, constantly surrounding herself with promiscuous behavior. Instead, she cleaned up her act and won the Miss Black Tennessee beauty pageant, got an on-air job at WVOL, and also won a full scholarship to Tennessee State University. From there she continued her career as a radio newscaster, and eventually had her own radio show. With continued persistence, Oprah gained her own television talk show and is now the highest-paid performer on television. Oprah’s ambition was what drove her to continue her fight through her hard childhood, and make a positive, healthy life for herself. If Oprah lacked the ambitious qualities that she had and gave up, she would likely be trapped as a damaged and troubled woman who let her passed experience define who she

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