Illegitimi non carborundum | Travel Research Online

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Illegitimi non carborundum

One of the great joys of my responsibilities at TRO and Travelhoppers is to work with the travel writers I have come to know.  Many are well-published writers and some of the younger ones are amazing talents I fully expect to see at the top of their profession in a few years.

One of them inspired me greatly over the past couple of days. I’m going to be circumspect here and not recount the entire controversy in which this particular writer, Kat Richter, found herself embroiled.  She has given me permission to do so and if you want to run down the details, you can. Suffice it to say that she was featured in a fashion magazine and then on a national morning news show, not about her writing, but about her plans for the future.  

A British newspaper picked up the story and ran it in a highly unflattering light. The worst was yet to come.

Using the anonymity provided by the Internet,  commenters on the British news piece savaged the young writer, attacking not only her ideas and her plans, but her physical appearance as well. The commenters were brutal, cruel, and deserving of a good lesson in manners from a mixed martial arts instructor (I know a few).

I do not know what inner pain my writer friend suffered.  I can only say that outwardly she handled the situation with grace and resolve.

Bravo.

Here’s the thing about lifting your head above the crowd: you become a target for the tomato throwers.  There is always a vulture lurking nearby just waiting for you to fall.  It’s not just that people  don’t understand dreams – they also don’t understand the people who dream.

How many great ideas do we not undertake for fear of failure or ridicule?

The title of this article is not real Latin.  It’s a made up phrase every now and then I find myself repeating. It’s worth looking up and memorizing.

Travel consulting means putting yourself on the line in a profession that many don’t understand.  Perhaps you have jumped out into your own business or perhaps you have plans to be the best travel professional in your city, your state, in the country.

You have dreams.

Bravo.

Never stop dreaming.

Illegitimi non carborundum.

“I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false, and to incur my own abhorrence. “ ~ Frederick Douglass


  4 thoughts on “Illegitimi non carborundum

  1. Kat says:

    Thanks, Richard 🙂 Will this title be available in bumper sticker form?

  2. Enjoyed the article. I do not know much Latin, but this phrase I know, and repeat it to myself when some fatherless person tries to harass me. It’s very soothing, and gets me beyond an unpleasant situation. Perhaps you would want to let those who do not know the expression, by loosely translating it as: Don’t let any Bully grind you down.

  3. Richard Earls says:

    Kat:

    Truly a great bumper sticker slogan!

    Joy:

    Here is a link to the Wikipedia translation of the phrase: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegitimi_non_carborundum

  4. Landlord says:

    Very nicely done. Love the expression, if I could only pronounce it correctly and correctly when I needed it 😉
    I agree it needs a logo/poster art bumper sticker presence!

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