It’s Your Choice That Makes It

We all have weaknesses and strengths—no matter who we are. Sometimes the weaknesses seem to outweigh the strengths and sometimes it’s the other way around. Some people get sick easily. Some struggle to manage their finances properly. Some people are hopeless communicators and struggle with relationships.

Many people leave it and accept that as just bad luck—but not everyone. Some people facing huge limitations still manage to achieve tremendous things. They rise above their weaknesses and do not allow them to limit their possibilities.

I attended a school prize-giving ceremony not so long ago and the guest speaker was Andrew Becroft， who had a severe stutter as a child. Instead of allowing this to limit him， he chose to work hard to overcome it. He is now the Principal Youth Court Judge for New Zealand. Not only did he become successful， but he did so in a profession where he had to speak in front of others regularly—where his weakness is front and center for all to see. If he hadn’t worked on his speaking ability， it would have been very limiting to his life and career prospects.

Lots of people face far more significant limitations than you do. They may be missing limbs or are born into extreme poverty. But no matter what the limitation is， you will always find people who have overcome it.

Ringo Starr， drummer for The Beatles， came from a very poor background. He was constantly plagued with illness as a child and spent large amounts of time in hospital.

At 19 months old， Helen Keller became ill and lost her sight and hearing (before she’d learned to speak). She went on to become a world famous author and speaker， and an advocate of many social causes.

Wilma Rudolph was the 20th of 22 children. As a child she suffered from all kinds of diseases， leaving her left leg and foot weak and deformed. Doctors said she would never walk again. However， she went on to win 3 gold medals in track during the 1960 Olympic Games.

Mark Inglis lost both of his legs below the knees in a mountaineering accident， but has since climbed Mt Everest.

Bill Wilson was an alcoholic who wanted to help other alcoholics and founded what was to become Alcoholics Anonymous， a movement that has helped millions of people.

These above are cases involving individuals with significant limitations， and it can be easy to write them off as exceptions to the rule， but that’s not the case. They were just people with problems. If one of these people had told you what they hoped to achieve you would have nodded kindly while quietly thinking to yourself that they had no chance. And yet the results speak for themselves. No one would have predicted these successes.

outweigh 超過

limitation 局限

tremendous極大的

stutter口吃

prospect前途

limb肢體

poverty貧窮

drummer 鼓手

plague折磨

deformed 畸形的

Mt Everest 珠穆朗瑪峰

alcoholic 酗酒者

Alcoholics Anonymous

嗜酒者互誡協會

write...off as把……看成

（1） The underlined word “them” in Paragraph 2 refers to _______.

A. huge limitations

B. their possibilities

C. their weaknesses

D. tremendous things

（2） Why does the author mention the various successes of some disabled people?

（Find the KEY in this issue）