Category: Motivation

Are you the kind of person who makes a decision to do something or do you tend to go along with whatever happens? Sometimes it can be difficult to be a proactive decision maker for your own life when there’s something like muscular dystrophy hanging over your head. However, by making some positive life decisions, you can start looking at muscular dystrophy like you do the weather — it has an effect on you but you can deal with it.

The decision to accept

Accepting the impact of muscular dystrophy is a very important step. For me, it meant starting to be open about it with people once I got to college. It was extremely freeing to tell people my story and eventually the disorder became as inconsequential to me as having brown hair. It is just something I have, deal with appropriately, and refuse to let take over my existence.

The decision to do what you want anyway

If there’s something you love to do, there’s usually a way to figure out how to do it. I have mentioned this many times before on this blog. The most powerful thing you can do is make the decision to do what you want. I decided several years ago that I wanted to play wheelchair tennis in tournaments all around the world and get a world ranking. Once I made the decision to do that, the rest became a natural progression of smaller decisions like, “Where am I going to take lessons?” and “Which tournaments should I play in?”

The decision to take action

Sometimes mental stumbling blocks lead us to convince ourselves that “this will be too difficult” or “that’s not possible” or “that will take too much work.” We translate physical difficulties into mental ones and then we don’t even try. Deciding to try to figure out a way past an obstacle is often the only motivation you need to start conquering the real, physical, obstacle. Why let something going on inside your brain keep you from doing something you haven’t physically tried yet?

The decision to keep moving

Whatever it is you want to decide to do, whether it’s get a job, take a trip, volunteer somewhere, buy a new car, or move to a new place, there’s always a next task or next step waiting for you. Sometimes it seems like these steps are endless, but they’re not. If you keep moving forward, making the little decisions and taking actions, you’ll get there eventually. Then you’ll look back and amaze yourself by reflecting on all you did to get there.

People who go along for the ride waste a lot of time. They wait for things to happen to them vs. decide to go out and do the things they want. It doesn’t work for the small things and it really doesn’t work for the big things. Think about it — if you were hungry for pizza would you just sit at home and wait for one to show up? No! You’d decide to order one and get on the phone! So why let the bigger things try to find their way to you? Decide what you want to do then go do it!

Do you limit your dreams by thinking about your disability first? I’ll admit sometimes it’s easy to immediately think, “Oh but that will be too difficult because of my wheelchair…” or some other excuse. People who don’t have a disability think this way too about things in their lives too.  To overcome this I remind myself to dream first and plan later. Here’s why:

1) You never know where a dream might lead you.

One of the first rules of brainstorming is never judge an idea when it comes out. Why? Because that idea, even if not feasible, could lead to a different idea that could work. Ideas are connected to one another and you never know where one idea might lead.

2) Few things are impossible.

Say you want to climb a mountain? Did you know that there’s a guy with no arms and no legs that is training to do just that? I’ve also read about people who use wheelchairs ascending mountains too, not necessarily in their wheelchairs but as part of a group that went climbing.

3) Don’t forget about human power.

If humans could assemble Stonehenge, then humans can help you when your disability necessitates it. Sometimes I forget that if necessary, a bunch of people could get together and lift me and/or my chair up a step or down a hill or into a car or onto a boat. I can’t even count how many times strangers have assisted me if necessary. People are always around to help.

4) A decision is not action. You can always change your mind.

Dreaming about cruising down the Amazon river is much different than actually cruising down the Amazon. Why? Because the latter requires action. Even the planning stages don’t require real action yet. So why would you want to say, “No!” before you even get to the planning stage? The planning stage is the place where you can REALLY come to learn about how much effort you are willing to put in to achieve a dream. Nothing is lost but a little time, so why not at least explore your dream a bit before deciding against it?

5) Surprises await.

Thanks to the Internet there are many tools out there to explore and plan your dream trip, dream job, dream activity, or whatever dream is out there. You might be surprised to find there’s someone out there who has already done exactly what you want to do and has laid out their plans right there in front of you!

6) You’re not alone.

If you want to visit Ireland but don’t know anybody there and have no idea where to start, then start with an expert. There are many accessible travel experts out there who can guide you or even set you up with an accessible tour! If you’re trying to break into a certain field, there’s probably someone out there with a disability who you could talk to and figure out where to go next. Seeking out help is often as simple as a Google search. Go ahead try searching for help with your dream right now using the form below!

@import url(http://www.google.com/cse/api/branding.css);

Custom Search

Imagine you just received an email from someone you didn’t know. The message contains a greeting, several sentences, and a closing. There’s nothing special about the message. It’s just a bunch of words strung together and composed like any other email message.

Would you be able to tell if the sender of the message had a disability?

Absolutely not.

The same goes for a phone call. Can you tell if someone uses a wheelchair because of the way they sound on the phone? Not likely.

How about art? Can you tell if a painting has been crafted by someone with a disability? Again, no.

And what about a song? Is it possible to spot someone who has no legs by listening to a recording of them singing a song? No.

There are many examples of instances when a mobility-related disability is absent from a situation. It’s not applicable. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t change the words in an email, the paint on a canvas, or the words you speak.

Aside from physical labor and tasks, why does having a disability have to matter at all?

That’s right, it doesn’t have to matter.

I was thinking about a few of the people who have motivated, dare I say “inspired,” me to do something different, conquer a fear, or keep myself pushing along. Often times it’s someone whose story I’ve seen on the internet or television. Occasionally it’s someone who I see in public do something nice or new. There are times when examples from relatives and friends push me to make a change as well.

I started thinking about these moments of inspiration and realized that very few of the people who have motivated me actually know that they’ve done this. I don’t usually send an email or make a phone call to thank someone who has inspired me. I don’t think most people do this. We tend to get fussy when something isn’t going our way and that’s when the pens and paper come out. If things are moving in a positive direction, we often don’t take time to appreciate the person who has helped get us going.

This isn’t a plea to start thanking everyone who has had an impact on you. Rather, I’m calling attention to the fact that you never know who will be motivated by you and your actions. After I posted the story of Bob McPhee, it occurred to me that he will never possibly know how many people his story has impacted. What’s even more interesting is that Bob’s story, while extraordinary, is really based on the fact that he decided to just continue living life and doing the things he wanted to do.

So isn’t it encouraging to know that you can simply live your life — disability or not — and know that it’s going to have an impact on someone else and probably many more people than you’ll ever know? Inevitably you’re going to face and beat challenges, accomplish something neat, or do something new. This is a part of human life for those of us who choose to live it.

So do your thing, share your story, and know that you’re going to have an impact on someone, somewhere, sometime.