Sunny Akhigbi on Choosing his Freedom and Destiny Amid Hardships and Destitution

Enter the Lionheart

Lawrence Dunning

Entrepreneurship, Business, Philosophy, Society & Culture

4.9 • 67 Ratings

🗓️ 2 December 2021

⏱️ 69 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Lawrence is joined by Sunny Akhigbi, an unbelievably resilient survivor of trauma and destitution growing up in a small rural village of Nigeria. Despite his family trying to contain him in a horrific environment of hard child labor, he managed to get his high school education. He went on to get a college education regardless of almost dying from being caught in the gang warfare that threatened his campus. He persevered through the hardships, as his motto was "to get educated was to be free". Today he is the epitome of the American, immigrant success story. Sunny looks like a real life superhero. He is a celebrity trainer, an endurance athlete, a former bodybuilder, and a male model. He is also a published author, a devoted single father of two lovely children, and primarily motivated by philanthropy. But, behind his smile and impressive stature and background, no one would ever be able to guess the colossal hardships most would not be able to survive.

Sunny is unbreakable! His energy and positivity is really infectious and he makes you want to join his mission. His charity is funded in his own dime, and 100% of the donations go to spreading literacy to the under privileged youth in the rural villages of Nigeria. His first annual Gala is this Saturday (click on the link below to purchase tickets).

A Boy and His Dream Gala

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the End of the Lion Heart Podcast with your host, Laurence Dunning.
0:12.0	I'm really excited to be talking more with Sunny Akebe. Sunny and I have some mutual
0:20.2	friends we run in similar circles, but I didn't get to meet him in person until a group
0:24.6	dinner about a month ago. For quite a while I've had different people
0:28.6	been telling me that I had to get him on the podcast and he has such a great story
0:32.8	I really should meet him, and he didn't take me long after sitting down with him to
0:36.4	see why. I got an inkling of some of the struggles of his youth, but until I read his
0:41.3	book, a boy and his dream, I couldn't have imagined some of the things that he persevered
0:46.1	through as a young boy in Nigeria. Sunny is a really accomplished man. He's in his
0:51.3	late 40s and physically looks like a superhero, which is impressive enough, but he's also
0:56.1	a celebrity trainer, an incredible endurance athlete. He has two professional bodybuilding
1:00.6	cards, he was a male model and he's a published author. But most impressive for me, and I'm
1:06.3	biased obviously as a new dad, is that he's an absolutely devoted single father with
1:11.2	full custody of his two lovely kids. And if that isn't enough, Sunny is hugely in philanthropy
1:17.0	and giving back to the underprivileged youth of which he was once. I'm excited to connect
1:22.3	the dots and learn more, and I hope you enjoy. Sunny, it's so great to have you with us.
1:27.6	This is Sunny Akibi, my new friend, but it's so great to have you here. Thank you. I
1:32.4	appreciate you. Thanks, Lawrence, and it's been a great moment, great time knowing you.
1:39.4	It's short, but feels like forever that I've known you for so long. There's an agreement.
1:44.6	You accepted me. So I went to Seoul and agreement. There's always a mutual grind. And
1:52.3	which is good. And Sunny, I always I use this expression, my friend. I say, some people
1:57.1	you meet their kindred spirits. And I think you and I are kindred spirits. We're both immigrants
	...

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