Earlier today, I saw a very inspirational You Tube video entitled, "Never Give up! A speech by a man with no limbs." Nick Vujicic, the star of this video, was born with no limbs and the doctors still have not found an explanation for his condition. Instead of taking his circumstances as a tragedy, he devotes his life to traveling around the world to deliver speeches that inspire people to stay strong and never give up.
In this video, he begins by entertaining the crowd with his ability to play a small drum with one foot. After the crowd's excitement, amazement, and laughter dies down, Vujicic purposely falls so that he is flat on his stomach. He then asks the crowd, "So, what do you do when you fall down?" Instinctively, many of the spectators join him in responding, "you get back up." Next he explains that sometimes in life, you fall down and you feel like you can't get back up. He relates this feeling to his personal experiences when he says that it's impossible for him to get up because he has neither arms nor legs. However, he says that he would attempt to get up as many times as he needs to in order to succeed because if he gives up, then he would never get up. He concludes by encouraging people to finish strong and find the strength to get up because it is not the end. Finally, Vujicic slowly brings himself to get up, showing the crowd that it is possible with effort.
This video motivates me to have a more positive outlook on life by striving to stay strong in the midst of tough situations. Everyone comes with their own struggles, obstacles, and disadvantages and some peoples' may be worse than others. Sometimes, I forget about these things when I am facing my own struggle, obstacle, or disadvantage. My first thoughts center around how terrible it feels to be in this predicament and how difficult it will be for me to overcome or improve it. In these situations, I have emotionally fallen down. At times, I can easily get back up. However, there are other times when I feel defeated. These instances occur mainly when I am constantly put down, or pushed down, to what feels like rock bottom. For instance, I lived my entire life visually impaired and sometimes, this can become very overwhelming. When I am constantly failing at a task, getting lost, or feeling that I am at a great disadvantage because I do not have something that others do, it is hard for me to find the strength to improve these situations. Emotionally, I am down on my stomach and I know that I only have to choices: get up or give up. By getting up, I will enable myself to keep trying at a task, keep searching until I find my desired destination, or find an alternative item that would be equivalent to what others have. But if I give up, I will allow these feelings of defeat to continue taking over and every time another situation like this occurs, I will only lose hope, or strength, and I will not recover, or get up. Seeing how Nick Vujicic handles these situations, even with his circumstances, shows me that the problems that I have could be a lot worse and that there is no need to give up because of small obstacles in life because it is not the end. I am striving to look at things a lot differently and address situations more positively because in the end, I want to finish the race strong.
The man's approach is really similar to how I view obstacles now that I have grown up. That is to never tell yourself you can't do something just because others think you can't. People are constantly judging. For example, because I have dyslexia, it took me much longer to understand a math lesson in highschool. I never gave up. I didn't care that I had to go to tutoring and some other people didn't. I wanted to do the best I possibly could and I also tutored Math to some students even when my "friends" thought that I would struggle to do that.
ReplyDeleteWow! This really relates to me too. Some people just want to assume that you can't do something that may be far-reaching, but believing in yourself just does it all no matter what situation you are in. For example, I have been thinking of doing a certain career and when my parents heard this, they just didn't think I would be able to do it. But, their judgements isn't going to affect me because it's my decision and I will believe in myself in order to succeed. And that's how everyone should think; don't let anyone's opinion put you down.
ReplyDeleteThere were times in my life too, when I wanted to give up. An example for me, would be learning to ride a bike. When I was little, I thought that I could be seriously injured trying to ride one. My parents constantly told me to try and try but I refused. One day my dad forced me to ride a bike with his help. It wasn't so bad, but I didn't really get the hang of it at first. Soon after that day I was riding on my own and trying each day to get better at riding until I was one of the best bike riders on my street. I just goes to show you that if you keep trying at something you can become an expert someday.
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