I’m a fourth quarter amputee as you said and that
means I’ve lost my left shoulder my left arm in four
rips. And I was only 29 years
old when that happened. I had three children two one an
infant and the first day that I
was back out of intensive care. I was
looking at their pictures and I was you know in a
position at that time with a lot of the tubes out of me just to
be thinking about the future and it
did look very bright to me here. I am 29 years old the doctor
comes in and I’m dying to talk to him
and he says you’re under the knife for 11 and a half hours. We
had to you know, so you
back up because your vital signs for going down
and I said, well was it successfully said, I
think I got it all I’ll never forget him saying that because
my heart dropped. What do you mean you think you
got it all you just put me under 11 half an
hour operation I said and I’ve
lost my left arm and my shoulder. I
don’t
How I’m ever going to get make a living again. I’m sitting here looking at these three
kids wondering if I’ll have a job. Well, I have to go on permanent
disability. Just a thing that you were talking about here. I was taking
a deep dive down the rabbit hole thinking all the things
that could happen and I think it was Mark Twain at
once said some of our biggest worries in life never ever
happened to us.
How respond to adversity in life will write
your life story believe it or not, you know
perseverance is really the practice sessions for
handling adversity and becoming resilient
perseverance is setting a goal
for yourself this year that you’re going to lose 20 pounds and if you
get there great and if you don’t you lose 18 your world didn’t
fall apart. All right resilience is when
somebody takes something away from you. There’s a major
loss in your life.
And you have to rebound for it, but the only way that
you have resilience is if you work at perseverance as
if it’s a practice, there are three things. I can’t do I
cannot play the banjo. I cannot jump rope by myself
and I cannot give the number one sign left-handed to
angry Motors on 202.
And the notice it’s going away, but I couldn’t shape The
Funnel Vision. My middle linebacker was coming on to play
defense Bill Murray. He yells my name and I look
around and that’s what I and he grabs my helmet.
In terms it around. I was looking through my ear hole.
And he said in the end of the game.
Thank God he said I thought you broke your neck and well running around.
I was told don’t even think about hitting golf balls. You’ll
have a bad back this that and the
other and I found out so many of those things I could do if I
adapted and then he asked me to pull on his tie. And when
I did it was one of those clip-on ties
I had worn to school when I was in grade school. I was
the oldest of six kids and my mother didn’t have time to time my time before
I went to school each day and it came off in my hand.
And he said now if you’re going to have to wear a tie
each day, you’re going to have to get these clip on ties. And I
said, why is that he said? Well, he said because he’ll
never tie your tie again. I’ve been trying for over.
25 years the same with my shoes and it’s impossible. It
can’t be done. And if you go down to 5th and Madison Avenue and
you use my name, there’s a little tie shop down there. They’ll give
you a 10% discount and don’t forget to get at least they have
dozen because everybody leaves there with only a couple and they
really need it does a half a dozen or more and I said well, why
will I have to have clip on ties? Are you sure he said
you’ll never be able to tie your tie again. It can’t be
done one handed. I’ve been trying for over 25 years aim
for the Top If you aim for nothing, you’ll
hit it every time and if you aim beyond your
ability, wherever you fall will be
better than anything you could have ever achieved by not
trying at all.
The human spirit is stronger than anything that can happen to
it believe that the human spirit is
stronger to anything that can happen to it.
