Grow to Your Fullest
4 steps to rise above the crowd,
Bloom and Bear Fruit
Ling Zhang
Grow to Your Fullest
Hello, dear friends, welcome to my site! I'm Ling Zhang, the author of Grow to Your Fullest. I believe you come to here with a sound reason, with a purpose or a dream. I was born to be a dreamer.
Dreaming is the main theme of my life and dreams are my driven forces to live out each day with passion, hope and meaning. Dreams are the rainbows of my life. Here I will share with you my life journey in chasing rainbow dreams.
Growing up in a small village in China before eighties, poverty was around, no milk, no bread and no meat – I even ate wild vegetables and tree leaves. However, I was rich in dreams. The beauty of nature – twinkling stars, silvery moon light, radiant sun rise, flowers in seasons brought me many beautiful dreams.
As a little girl, every year I dreamed to have a shirt with flowers, especially at New Year times. I did not dare to ask because I knew my parents had no money. But that could not stop me dreaming, I closed my eyes – picturing I put on a fine made silk flowery shirt day after day. One summer, when I turned 12 years old, my father brought a piece of silk fabric home. My mother turned it into a beautiful shirt. I was so excited when I put it on and run out to show off the shirt to my little friends. Not enough I danced and danced in the yard – the winds were my music and the tree leaves clapped their hands. They all joined me for the new shirt celebration.
One day, I was told there is a country called America, a beautifule country and it is on the other side of the earth. I said, ‘Oh, it’s under my feet’. I dreamed to travel through a tunnel in the earth and came to the other side and touched the heels of a giant American…
After I learned science, the mysteries of nature attracted me more, why the moon wanes and waxes by month, how the day and night are formed. I dreamed to become a scientist like Albert Einstein. At one time, I dreamed to become a doctor, at another time, I dreamed to be a great author – but I ended up studying mathematics in a great university that I never dreamed.
Have my dreams been shattered? I believed it at some time. After graduated from college, I picked up one dream from childhood, came to America to gain my master degree in mathematics. But I did not come here through a tunnel in earth as I dreamed instead I flew to this country in the air. In 1998, I got a job as a software engineer. And during the next 2 years, I also got my master degree in computer science. I stayed Ohio for 17 years. Many big things happened in my life, but here I only give you two snapshots – first my values about life have turned upside down, From a person who did not believe in anything, I became a person of faith, I believed there is a God who started everything, my life and my dreams. Ever since I dreamed noble impossible dreams; second, I became a Toastmaster in 2006 that made me dream, one day I will be a speaker and an author so I published the book April 2014, Grow to your fullest to inspire people living out of their maximum.
Today I am here because I got a dream to come to America when I was a little girl; today I am a data scientist because I dreamed to be a scientist when I was little; today I am an author because also I dreamed to be. Now I am dreaming someday I can become an entrepreneur – as far as life continues, I will continue dreaming...