Inspirational speech
Nick Vujicic
This is not all of the speech. Nick Vujicic is a man who was born without any limbs; arms nor legs. He is an ispiration to young (and old) people. Here is a video link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gc4HGQHgeFE
“I want to talk about like when I started to go to school and stuff and a lot of people put me down, you know what I mean? A lot of people tease each other. I mean, people come up to me and say, ‘Hey! You’re fat! You’re fat! You’re fat! You’re fat! You’re fat…’ You know? ‘Lose some weight!’ And you go home and you look at yourself in the mirror and you go, ‘Ah! I’m fat!’ Right? And so many people tease each other. You know? You’re too short, you’re too tall, you look… whatever! Different hair and all that- it doesn’t matter! See, the thing is, when you’re in school, when you’re growing up in life, it actually sort of matters to people how you look. And then it matters to you because it matters to others. Why? Why does it matter how you look? Because, if they don’t like you, then who will? If they don’t accept you, then who will? And the fear that we have is that we’re going to be alone. That we’re not good enough and you know, we have to change ourselves.
And so many people put me down and said, ‘Nick, you look too weird, and no one’s really your friend and you can’t do this and you can’t do that.’ And I couldn’t change anything. It’s not like I was fixing my hair one day and everything was fine. It’s not like, you know, just whatever. I couldn’t change my circumstance. I couldn’t just one day wake up and say, ‘Hey, give me arms and legs. I need arms and legs.’ You know what I mean? Like… You go to a body builder and go, ‘Can you make me some arms and legs?’ No, I’m just joking! Body builder? You get it? Alright? This is, hey! I go up to people, ‘Can you give me a hand?’ I’m just joking! But it was so hard because people put me down. And I started believing that I was not good enough. I started believing that I was a failure. That I would never be somebody who people would like, people would accept. And it was so hard, man, and I thought to myself, ‘You know, I can’t go on the soccer field like everybody else. I can’t ride my bike, I can’t skateboard, and all these sort of things. ‘
I started getting depressed. I thought, ‘What kind of purpose to I have to live?’ I mean, are you here just to live to die? I mean, is there not a purpose for me? Is there a purpose in life? And I had questions and no answers. And I asked my mom and dad, ‘Why did this happen?’ I asked doctors, ‘Why did this happen?’ They don’t know.
There are some things in life that are out of your control that you can’t change and you’ve got to live with. The choice that we have, though, is either to give up or keep on going. I want to ask you, what are you going to believe? Are you going to believe in yourself or are you going to believe everybody else’s judgment on you? Are you going to believe people when they say that you’re a failure? That no one really likes you. That no one really cares about you. And it’s not really to say that you need someone to come up to you and say, ‘Hey, I really like you and I really care about you.’ You know, it’s not that. But it’s the fact that people put you down. People don’t even look you in the eye. People ask you how you are and you say, ‘Fine’ but you’re not really fine and they’ll never know that.
I tell you, life is interesting.
Life's a journey."
kiwi*