'If' by Rudyard Kipling

Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936), Nobel laureate, author of the children’s all-time favourite ‘The Jungle Book’, one of the most beloved poets, storytellers and novelists of his times, has been often criticised for his views in support of colonial rule. Whatever may be the truth of that controversy, here is a beautiful poem by Kipling titled ‘If’. The poem offers the perfect recipe for a satisfying life. Life demands enormous patience and courage, but it is worth it.

If

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;    

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, 

    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, 

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, 

    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise: 

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;    

    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;    

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster 

    And treat those two impostors just the same;    

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken 

    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, 

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, 

    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools: 

If you can make one heap of all your winnings 

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, 

And lose, and start again at your beginnings 

    And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew 

    To serve your turn long after they are gone,    

And so hold on when there is nothing in you 

    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’ 

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,    

    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, 

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, 

    If all men count with you, but none too much; 

If you can fill the unforgiving minute 

    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,    

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,    

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Rudyard Kipling