I just read where a double amputee climbed Mount Everest. It wasn’t all that long ago climbing Mount Everest was thought to be impossible. It wasn’t until Sir Edmund Hillary conquered Mount Everest in 1953. And now many people have reached the summit including Erik Weihenmeyer the first blind climber to reach the top. It seems the only limitations that we have are those that we bring on ourselves.
There have been several Track and Field athletes who overcame crippling diseases like polio only to go on to win gold medals in the Olympics. Doctors didn’t give them much chance to walk let alone run, but they didn’t let others set limitations for them.
My grandfather lived during a time of great accomplishment. He saw man transition from horse and buggy to the automobile. A time when the Wright Brothers were dreaming of flight to Linbergh crossing the Atlantic to Neil Armstrong walking on the moon. As a boy before radios first broadcast to a senior citizen watching on television Neil Armstrong take that first step.
All these accomplishments were realized because someone decided that it was possible. The only thing getting in the way of you accomplishing something is your own negativity. If you believe you can’t accomplish something you will fulfill your own destiny.
This was part of a presentation I gave to the Blind Center of Nevada yesterday. This was one of the most rewarding presentations I have given in along time. After this short little introduction I opened the room up for discussion. The group was passionate, energetic, and almost everyone had something to say. My goal was to get everyone to get out of their comfort zones and to try something that they have wanted to try, but were afraid to. I didn’t encourage them to climb their Mount Everest, but to start with smaller goals and work up to the big challenges.
One gentleman had been inspired by Jim Abbott the baseball player and how he had to overcome having only one hand and yet still making it to the major leagues as a pitcher for the Angels. He had to learn to throw and catch a baseball with only one hand. He would throw the ball, slip his glove on in the same movement so that he could catch the ball and then take off the glove to throw the ball to first base.
After hearing that story another participant told the story of how he played softball in the Blind Olympics and won a gold medal. They play with a ball that makes a sound so that they can find it. He was very proud of this. He said, he gets mad when someone threatens to punish him for trying something. The blind want to do as many things as possible with out help and sometimes when they try they feel like they are being punished.
Another lady told be that she hates it when people say, “You can’t do that.” She said, “How do they know I can’t until I try.”
When I was a teenager my parent’s were always getting after me for saying, “I can’t” to everything. Before I would even try I would say, “I can’t” or “I don’t want to.” This kind of negative thinking really puts restraints on you.
One lady said she wanted to start her own business educating the medical profession on how to treat the blind. She said, when a nurse calls your name at a doctors office to go back and see the doctor she will stand at the door and call out the name, but a blind person doesn’t know where the door is and will get up searching for the door tripping over other peoples feet trying to find the door.
Just then another lady said, “Yes, when I was in the hospital they would bring my food and put it on the table and not tell me. It would sit there and get cold. Someone else would come into the room and ask me how come I didn’t eat. I didn’t even know it had been delivered.”
Deb. the one coordinating the group said, before Maureen Keene (volunteers with communication classes) and I started coming to the group she was very introverted and spoke softly, but now she speak as an advocate to the blind. She got out of her comfort zone for her speaking was her Mount Everest.
Times have changed from when the blind were institutionalized or standing on the corner with a white cane begging for money. Today the blind can do many tasks and function quite well in a sited world and all they ask is that we treat them with the same respect of a sighted person, are patient with them and assist them when needed.