Life Without Limits (26 page)

Albert Einstein said that in the middle of every difficulty lies opportunity. The recent recession has left millions of people unemployed. Countless others have lost their homes and their savings. What good can come of hard times?

Among the major brand companies that started up during recessions and depressions are Hewlett Packard, Wrigley, UPS, Microsoft, Symantec, Toys “R” Us, Zippo, and Domino’s Pizza. The founders of these companies were looking for new and better ways to serve customers because previous models had failed during downturns. They seized the moment to create their own vision for doing business.

Without a doubt, the recession of 2006–9 had a profound and
lingering impact that hurt many, many families and businesses. But many of the people cast out by corporations and longtime employers responded by starting their own businesses, going back to school for advanced degrees, or finally pursuing their passion in life, whether it was opening a bakery, starting a gardening service, forming a band, or writing a book.

Among those laid off or terminated in the recession were thousands and thousands of journalists. The downturn hit their industry especially hard because it occurred just as newspapers around the world were losing their lucrative classified ad business to online services like craigslist. It’s been interesting to see how former journalists, who pride themselves on their resourcefulness and creativity, have responded. Several I know have launched new careers in public relations, nonprofit ventures, and Web-based media and blogs. One of my favorites is the former editor who left his shrinking California newspaper and became vice president of a booming crisis-management company that crafts “bankruptcy communications” for other businesses in decline. This is the Taking Lemons and Making Lemonade philosophy, which is really all about shifting your focus from moaning about the problem to finding a creative solution. You have to be flexible, determined, and ready to turn a potentially negative situation into a positive situation. One of the big American retail chains teaches its sales staff to view customer complaints as invitations for building better relationships with store patrons.

It’s a matter of reframing. I do it whenever my schedule hits a snag by reminding myself that “God does not waste His time, so He doesn’t waste mine either.” In other words, it all works out for the good. I truly believe that, and you should too. When you buy into that philosophy, stand back. I’ve seen it proven true time and time again.

A few years ago I was flying with my caregiver across the country. At one airport our flight was delayed (no surprise), and when we finally were on the plane and taxiing from the departure gate, I looked out the window and saw smoke coming from the engine.

A fire truck came roaring up. The firefighters jumped out and sprayed foam on the engine to put out the blaze.
Due to a small fire in the engine
, the passengers were told,
we will be conducting an emergency evacuation of this plane
.

Well, all right, I thought. Fire in the engine was not good, but being on the ground when the “small fire” broke out was a plus. When it was announced that our flight would be delayed another two hours, many of my fellow passengers complained loudly and bitterly. I was irritated but glad we had been spared a possible mid-flight emergency, or so I told myself.

Still, I struggled a bit to remain positive since we were on a tight schedule.
Remember, God doesn’t waste time
, I told myself. Then came yet another announcement: They’d lined up another plane at another gate to take us immediately.
Good news!

We hurried to the new departure gate, boarded yet another plane, and settled in for the flight. I was relieved until I noticed that the woman sitting next to me was quietly weeping.

“Is there something I can do?” I asked.

She explained that she was flying to visit her fifteen-year-old daughter, who was in danger of dying after a routine surgery had gone terribly wrong. I did my best to comfort the mother. We talked for nearly the entire flight. I even drew a smile from her after she told me she was nervous about flying.

“You can hold my hand if you like,” I teased.

When we landed at our destination, the mother thanked me for comforting her. I told her I was grateful that I’d ended up seated next to her on the plane after so many delays and gate changes.

God had not wasted my time that day. He knew what He was doing. He put me next to that woman to help her with her fears and grief. The more I thought about that day, the more grateful I was for the chance to offer this woman a sympathetic ear.

A lost loved one, a broken relationship, a financial setback, or an illness can break you if you let grief and despair overtake you. One way to fight through those challenges is to stay alert for what rises up even when life seems to be taking you down.

I met the photographer Glennis Siverson on the set of
The Butterfly Circus
. Though she lives in Orlando, Glennis had come to California to serve as the set photographer at the invitation of the directors and her friends the Weigels. Glennis is an award-winning photographer whose work is commissioned by magazines, corporations, newspapers, and Web sites. She also does portrait and nature photography. She loves photography. It is her passion.

But for more than twenty years, Glennis worked in the human resources field for big companies. She lost her “safe and secure” job in the recession. Glennis took that kick in the pants and used the forward momentum to pursue her passion. She became a full-time photographer.

“I decided it was now or never!” she said.

Great story, right? Glennis is a real-life example of someone who took a potentially negative event and used it as an opportunity to create an even better life.

Terrific! Wonderful!

But there’s more. You see, Glennis, the award-winning photographer, can hardly see. She is legally blind.

“Ever since I was a child I have had poor eyesight,” she said. “I got glasses at age five and my vision kept getting worse. Then around 1995 I was diagnosed with corneal disease. The cornea is
misshapen and degenerates. It got to the point that I couldn’t see out of my left eye. Since I had extremely severe nearsightedness, it was past the threshold to get Lasik surgery. My only option was a cornea transplant.”

In 2004 Glennis underwent that surgery. Her doctor had told her that it would correct the vision in her left eye to 20/40 without glasses or contacts. “But everything that could go wrong pretty much did—short of losing my eye,” she said. “The operation made my vision worse. I also got glaucoma as a result. My vision worsened in my left eye, and then, unrelated to the operation, I had a hemorrhage on the retina of my right eye. So I have a blind spot on it.”

Laid off from her job of twenty years, and all but blinded by failed surgery and a hemorrhaged retina, Glennis could not be blamed for despairing and giving up. You might expect her to grow bitter and angry.

Instead, she was grateful to soar higher and farther. “I don’t think of myself as
disabled
. I think of myself as
enabled
, because being nearly blind has made me a better photographer,” she said.

She can no longer see fine details, but instead of feeling deprived, she is grateful that she is free not to obsess about the little things anymore.

“Prior to losing most of my eyesight, if I was doing portrait photography, I was focused on every strand of hair and every angle of the person’s body. My work looked stiff because I was so focused on composition. But now my approach is pretty much a gut reaction. I feel it. I see it, and I shoot it. My work is more instinctual, and I interact with people and surroundings much more.”

Glennis said her photographs now are flawed but are more artful, more compelling. “One gal actually cried when she saw my images of her because she felt I’d captured her so well,” she said. “I had never moved anyone emotionally before.”

Since she lost much of her eyesight, Glennis has won ten international awards for her portrait and landscape photography.
One of her photos was selected from sixteen thousand entries for an exhibition of just 111 works. She’s had photos selected for four exhibitions at the Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Her blindness would never have allowed Glennis to continue her job in human resources, but many great artists such as Monet and Beethoven thrived despite disabilities because they used them as opportunities to explore their art in new and fresh ways. Grateful, Glennis told me that her favorite Bible verse is now “We live by faith, not by sight.”

“That literally is my life now. I’ve had to make adjustments, sure. I worry about being totally blind. It’s been very, very scary. There is no manual for this.”

She is on a new path, but instead of seeing it as a disruption in her life, she views it as a gift. “I’d been very controlling before. Now I try to live day to day and enjoy each moment,” she said. “I also try to be grateful that I have a roof over my head and I’m alive and the sun is shining and I don’t worry about tomorrow because we never know what tomorrow will bring.”

Glennis is a great lady, who embraces opportunity, don’t you agree? She inspires me, and I hope she inspires you to look for ways to advance your dreams, choose them wisely, and then act upon them when your heart says “go.”

W
e were halfway through a five-city tour of Indonesia where I was speaking thirty-five times in nine days. I should have been dog tired. Sometimes on these manically busy stretches I rev up and can’t settle down. We were headed to Java, and just as we were boarding the plane from Jakarta to Semarang, a rush of energy swept over me.

Five people were traveling with me, including my caregiver Vaughan, who is a big, strong, fun-loving guy. The female flight attendants were quite impressed with him as we boarded the plane, and we were teasing back and forth. They let us on first because I have to get out of my wheelchair and walk through the plane to my seat. As I headed down the aisle of the plane with Vaughan behind me, I suddenly had this urge to try something crazy that I’d thought about doing for a while.

“Vaughan, quick, before anyone else comes aboard—lift me up and see if I fit in the overhead baggage compartment!”

We’d often joked about doing this. A few days earlier I’d had Vaughan place me inside the metal frame at the departure for seeing if your luggage will fit in the overhead compartment. I easily fit, so they started calling me “the Carry-on Kid.”

The overhead compartment was quite high, and I wasn’t sure anyone could lift my seventy-four pounds up there, but Vaughan had no trouble. He hoisted me up and gently placed me on my side in the compartment as if I were a Vuitton instead of a Vujicic.

“Okay, now close the door,” I said, “and let’s wait for the other passengers to come on board.”

Vaughan tucked a pillow under my head and snapped the door shut, leaving me perched above the seats. The flight attendants saw what we were up to and cracked up with laughter. We were all snickering like schoolkids, so I wasn’t sure we would pull off this prank. But the other passengers came up the ramp, unaware of the stowaway in the overhead.

My crew and the flight attendants could hardly contain themselves when an older gentleman came down the aisle and reached up to put his bag in my compartment. He opened the door—and nearly jumped through the roof of the airplane.

I popped my head out. “Sir, I don’t believe you even knocked!”

Luckily, he was a good-natured bloke, and we all had a nice belly laugh. Then while still perched in the overhead, I had to pose for a couple hundred pictures with him, other passengers, and the flight attendants. Of course Vaughan kept threatening to leave me up there, warning that “some items may shift in flight.”

In the first ten chapters I’ve offered you encouragement and guidance about finding your purpose, being hopeful, believing in yourself, maintaining a good attitude, acting with courage, practicing resilience, mastering change, forming empowering relationships, and acting upon opportunities that move you closer to your dreams.

Now I want you to get a little crazy. Just like me.

I’m being ridiculous, of course. In fact, ridiculous is exactly what I want you to be too. I am the creator of the Ridiculous Rules, which hold that every living, breathing person on the planet should be committed to doing something ridiculous at least once a day, whether it’s risking looking ridiculous to pursue a dream or simply having ridiculous fun.

My Ridiculous Rules spring from one of my favorite quotes: “Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it’s better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.”

Now the alleged author of that intriguing quotation is not exactly one of my role models, but I think the late actress Marilyn Monroe was on to something when she uttered it. Naturally, I agree that imperfection is beauty, why wouldn’t I? You can’t argue either with the fact that madness is genius—in the sense that anyone who takes risks is bound to be considered a madman by some and a genius by others. And yes, I do think it’s better to be absolutely ridiculous than to be absolutely boring.

You can master every other lesson in this book, but if you aren’t willing to take some risks or dare to be called crazy by those who doubt your genius, then you likely will never achieve all that you dream of achieving. And for your sake and the planet’s, please dare to be playful too. Don’t forget to laugh at yourself and kick up your heels now and then so that you enjoy the journey.

I’m as guilty as anyone of falling into an overscheduled, all-work-and-not-enough-play lifestyle. I was determined to become a successful evangelist and a motivational speaker. To hone my speaking skills, I hit the road, jumping on every speaking invitation I could line up. After eight dizzying years of nonstop touring and speaking, I’ve become more selective. I need more balance.