I experienced firsthand what it means to be poor, what it means to go hungry, and that, I think, may be the reason, the root cause of why I'm able to work so hard, even these days.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time.
There is something to be said for people who have to work hard, be creative, produce what they have with little - or no - means. Those of us from poor homes have the advantage of thinking for ourselves and of knowing that when times get hard, things could always be worse.
I don't think people understand that being poor means you have to work from dawn until dusk just to survive through the day. I think there's some notion that poor people lie about all day not doing anything.
Poverty is about people lacking the tools they need to get on in life. And solving it is about tackling educational failure, antisocial behaviour, debt problems and addiction, and of course it's about work.
I grew up in poverty and my mother had to sacrifice a lot for us to eat and get an education - just imagine in a house where we were more than six children! But hard work and dedication is what it took for me to be here today.
I was poor. When you're poor you work, and when you're rich you expect somebody to hand it to you. So I think being reasonably poor is very good for people.
When you are poor, you'll have to think of ways to be better off.
I don't really believe in the myth of being poor but happy. At the poorest times in my life, I wasn't happy. I was just hungry.
Poverty entails fear and stress and sometimes depression. It meets a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts that is something on which to pride yourself but poverty itself is romanticized by fools.
Poor people are those who only work to try to keep an expensive lifestyle and always want more and more.