Overcoming adversity

Hi everyone. Last week, I promised to share about some inspirational people. So, meet Steven Robinson, the one-armed pilot.

Steven lost his right arm at the age of 18 after a tragic motor-cross accident and this came after enduring bullying throughout his educational life.

One can only imagine the extra challenges this accident brought physically, mentally, emotionally and psychologically.

He had a choice to make – give up all hope or fight on? I was so inspired by Steven’s positivity and hilarious delivery of his life’s story, that his disability faded into insignificance. It was one of those moments that make you realise, ‘there are no excuses’ for giving up’.

My take-away from Steven’s story include:

You can choose to see the good in everything

After he lost his right arm, all his job opportunities were gone but he asked himself, ‘is this a good or a bad thing?’ He realised there was a blessing in that he could now choose what to do.

Steve tried his hands on many jobs including DJ and breakdancing – ‘jobs that should have been out of his reach’.

Fight for what you believe

The younger Steven was bullied before but he learnt to fight back. This experience came in handy later in life when he had to fight to retain ownership of his invention, refusing to be bullied into submission.

Don’t get hung up on your past

The most useless cloud is up above, and the most useless bit of runway is behind you. For a pilot, remembering this can be the difference between life and death. His focus has to always be on the future in terms of where he’s flying to and how to safely land at his destination.

Should you give in or give up? Don’t ever do that

Before Steven could fly, he needed both arms but his first two ‘professionally made’ prosthetic arms failed. He could have legitimately packed it in at that point, but he decided to make his own prosthetic arm which worked. Today Steve has learnt to fly in the face of fear and he is a fully qualified private pilot.

If you don’t ask, you never get. So, ask

Ask someone for something today. Share your ideas with someone, tell others about your product, send your manuscript to yet another publisher. You get the gist. Ask, ask and ask again.

Believe that anything is possible. Never give in. Realise you can do things regardless of the limitations you have or see.

Don’t compete with anyone else, only compete with yourself

If Steve had been competing against others, he would have set his sights too low and accomplished a lot less than he has done.

By competing only with himself, Steve overcame many odds and became a successful innovator and entrepreneur, author, motivational speaker, made the Queen’s New Year’s Honours list (2017/18) and was recently awarded Yorkshire inspirational Individual of the year 2017.

Steve’s overarching message is that we can overcome obstacles and build the future we want.

Please share this with someone else to inspire, encourage and challenge them. See you next week and thank you for reading and following my blog.