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“The only disability is a bad attitude”
—Scott Hamilton, Olympic Figure Skater

Rocky. Rudy. Wilma Rudolph. Helen Keller. Joni Eareckson Tada. Corrie Ten Boom. Harriet Tubman. Madame C.J. Walker.  Frederick Douglass. George Washington Carver. These are all individuals who had to overcome great obstacles in order to become the great figures in history that they have become. We love their stories and their quotes because they remind us of how much we enjoy to hear of the triumph of the human spirit.
What would our history be if it were not filled with accounts of individuals standing against all odds for justice or liberty? How would Hollywood make money if it did not have storylines of the small person standing up to the threats of the big enemy? We love this stuff...but how do we respond when we have the opportunity to become the ones who overcomes some great tragedy? Success and victory are uncomfortable and they require vision, faith, and resolve!
I was recently in Seattle speaking at a church retreat and saw my friend Steve. We met a year ago at the same retreat and we became fast friends. Steve was born in Taiwan and put up for adoption because he suffered from cerebral palsy. He’s now living in Seattle with his adopted family. Although he as been in a wheelchair for his entire life, he refuses to think like a victim. In fact, when Steve was 15 years old he decided to start giving motivational speeches about overcoming the disability of excuse-making so that he could change the way others saw people with disabilities and how they saw themselves.
Today, Steve is a serious athlete. He does 2000 (I didn’t stutter!) crunches a day...10,000 each week. In 2010, he won the gold medal for discus at the International Wheelchair and Amputee Sports (IWAS) Federation World Games in the Czech Republic while battling pneumonia. He is currently training for the Paralympic Games in London this summer when he will compete in the discus and shot put. And if all this is not enough, he has created his own business called Beyond Disabilities (www.beyond-disabilities.com) and he advocates for individuals with disabilities. He just returned from Taiwan where he was invited back by the agency that handled his adoption as a infant and he spoke to a crowd of nearly 800 people with disabilities.
I learned of Scott Hamilton’s quote from my friend Steve. Scott — and Steve — both remind me that we accept excuses too readily in society today. We pity students rather than challenge them. We lower expectations rather than helping people to aim high. We have glorified mediocrity as the standard and deem the overcomer as superhuman. In all honesty, our obstacles should provoke us to become better individuals. My friendship with Steve has caused me to appreciate the strong people in his life and the strong faith in his heart. Being around him makes me acknowledge the fact that if we don’t do something differently in society, we will raise another generation of victims and not world-changers.

I have known Steve (www.steveferreira.com) for over a year and have NEVER once heard him complain about his disease. In fact, he told me that he’s grateful for it because it has forced him to be strong in other ways. What would our society be like if we taught everyone to think like Steve? Shall we endeavor to find out?

Think like a winner because you can be! It’s your decision and yours alone.Dr. Gee is the senior pastor of Fountain of Life Church and the president/founder of The Nehemiah Corporation.  You can find out more about Dr. Alex Gee at www.alexgee.com or follow him on Twitter at @alexgeejr.