![Dwayne_Johnson by Eva Rinaldi [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Wikimedia Commons](https://2paragraphs.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Dwayne_Johnson_2_2013-620x375.jpg)
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has built his career, brand, and reputation on the principles of “hard work and sacrifice.” And that usually means finding a way to surge past disappointment and rejection and blaze a new trail, despite the naysayers.
After all, the list of those who hear “yes” the first time — and then over and over again — is very short. Significantly, it’s those who hear “no” early on that often occupy the list of greats when all is said and done.
This week the NFL required teams to cut their rosters to the season-ready limit of 53 players. That means the player who is #54 is out. Told he is almost good enough, but not quite.
It’s a symbolically potent number — we’re all #54 in life at some point (even NBA GOAT Michael Jordan has been cut from the team, you know?) You may feel like a #54 today at your job, at your school, on your team — don’t let it beat you.
That attitude — never surrender to defeat — is why The Rock took the opportunity presented by the NFL cuts as a teaching moment. He uses it to honor the # 54’s everywhere, and to spur them on — tell them to use this new big chip on their shoulders to achieve more, to strive on.
The Rock tells his fans that he has also been a 54 –proudly so — and he congratulates the new members of the 54 Club by saying: “You now have #54 DNA running thru your veins. Congratulations, now you have the chip. Now you’re unstoppable…”
“To all my fellow #54’s out there. I know the pain and I’ve been in your shoes. After years of hard work and sacrifice, you’ve been told you’re not good enough.”
But it’s not true, The Rock asserts. Don’t listen to them. What do they know anyway? Now go get it.
