All through the morning’s spelling, geography, and math classes I fretted about my lunchtime appointment with the school bully. It didn’t help that word had spread throughout the school that I was taking on Chucky. Everybody wanted to know my plan of attack. I had no clue.
I kept envisioning Chucky punching my lights out. I prayed that some teacher would find out and stop the fight before we started. No such luck.
The dreaded hour arrived. The lunch bell sounded. My posse gathered around my wheelchair, and we rolled to the Oval in silence. Half the school was there. Some brought their lunches. A few were taking bets.
As you might guess, I was the decided underdog in the early betting.
“You ready to fight?” said Chucky.
I nodded yes, but I had no idea how this would go down.
Chucky wasn’t so sure either. “Uh, how we gonna do this?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“You gotta get out of your wheelchair,” he demanded. “It isn’t fair with you in the wheelchair.”
Apparently Chucky feared a hit and run. This gave me a negotiating point. Fighting was not my cup of tea, but I was already a good negotiator.
“If I get out of this chair, you have to get on your knees,” I said.
Chucky was being razzed about picking on a kid in a wheelchair. He went along with my counterdemand. My stocky foe dropped to his knees, and I hopped out of my chair, ready for my big Crocodile Dundee moment—if only I could figure out how to go about fighting without fists.
I mean, they don’t call it a “shoulder fight,” do they?
The lunchtime crowd ringed around us as Chucky and I circled each other. I was still thinking that he wouldn’t possibly go through with it. Who would be so low as to hit a little kid with no arms and no legs?
Girls in my class were crying, “Nicky, don’t do it. He’ll hurt you.”
That got to me. I didn’t want girl pity. My macho pride kicked in. I walked right up to Chucky like I knew I could kick his butt.
He gave me a double stiff arm to the chest, and I went backward arse over earlobes, flopping onto the concrete like a sack of potatoes.
Chucky had gobsmacked me! I’d never been knocked down like that. It hurt! But the embarrassment was far worse. My schoolmates huddled over me, horrified. Girls cried out, shielding their eyes from what they thought was a pitiful sight.
This bloke is really trying to hurt me, I realized. I flipped over and pressed my forehead to the ground. Then I leveraged a shoulder against my wheelchair to get myself upright. This technique made for a calloused forehead and a very strong neck, qualities that would soon spell Chucky’s downfall.
I had no doubt: Chucky had no qualms about kicking my butt. It was fight or flight, and flight wasn’t a realistic option.
I charged Chucky again, with a bit more speed behind me this time. Three hops, and I was right in front of him. But before I could think what to do next, Chucky nailed me with a straight arm. Just one arm bam to the chest, and I slammed to the ground. I even bounced once. Okay, maybe twice.
My head conked on the hard-hearted Oval. The world faded to black. A shrieking girl quickly brought me back to my senses.
I prayed for the teacher cavalry. Why can you never find an assistant principal when you need one?
Finally my vision cleared, and there was the evil Chucky hovering over me. The fat-faced mongrel was doing a victory dance.
That does it. I’m laying this bloke out!
I flipped onto my stomach, planted my forehead, and raised myself up for a final charge. My adrenaline was pumping. This time I galloped at him as fast as I could go, which was a lot faster than Chucky had anticipated.
He’d started to backpedal on his knees. I took a flying leap, using my left foot to launch myself like a human missile. My flying head butted Chucky smack in the nose. He went down. I landed on top of him and rolled.
When I looked up, Chucky was sprawled on the ground, holding his nose and bawling uncontrollably.
Instead of feeling victorious, I was overcome by guilt. The pastor’s son begged for forgiveness: “I’m so sorry, are you okay?”
“Look, Chucky’s bleeding!” a girl cried.
No way, I thought.
But sure enough, blood from Chucky’s nose was leaking through his pudgy fingers. He took his hand away, and it poured down his face and stained his shirt in bright red.
Half the crowd was cheering. The other half was mortified—for Chucky. After all, he’d just been beat up by a shrimp with no arms or legs. He would never live this down. Chucky’s bullying days were over. He pinched his nose with his fingers and scurried into the bathroom.
Honestly, I never saw him again. He must have quit school in shame. Chucky, if you are out there, I’m sorry, and I hope you have had a good post-bully life.
I was proud of sticking up for myself but burdened by guilt. After school I went home and confessed to my parents as soon as I walked in the door. I was dreading a severe punishment. But I had no need to be worried. Dad and mum didn’t believe me! They simply did not think it possible that I’d beaten up a bigger, older, and fully-equipped bloke!
I didn’t try to convince them otherwise.
As much as people enjoy hearing this story and as funny as certain aspects of it are, I have mixed feelings about even telling it, since I don’t advocate violence. I believe meekness is strength withheld. I’ll always remember my first—and only—fight because I discovered that when push came to shove, I could overcome my fears. At that age especially, it felt good to know that I had the strength to defend myself. I guess you could say I learned that I could afford to be meek because I had tapped the strength inside me.
NO ARMS, NO LEGS, NO FEAR
You may have a strong sense of purpose, great hope for the possibilities in your life, faith in your future, an appreciation for your own value, and even a great attitude, but fear can hold you back from achieving your dreams. There are many handicaps worse than having no arms and no legs—fear can be especially debilitating. You cannot live a fulfilling life that fully expresses your blessings if fear controls your every decision.
Fear will hold you back and keep you from being who you want to be. But fear is just a mood, a feeling—it’s not real! How often have you feared something—a trip to the dentist, a job interview, an operation, or a test in school—only to discover that the actual experience was not nearly as bad as you had imagined?
I thought I would get creamed in my first-grade fight with Chucky-boy, but look how that turned out! All too often adults revert back to childish fears. They go back to acting like kids frightened at night because they imagine that the tree limb scraping the bedroom window is actually a monster trying to eat them up.
I’ve seen fear absolutely paralyze otherwise normal people. I’m not referring to scary movie fears or childhood fears of bumps in the night. So many people are handicapped by fear of failure, fear of making mistakes, fear of making a commitment, even fear of success. It’s inevitable that fears will come knocking on your door. You don’t have to let them in. You send them on their way, and then go on yours. You have that choice.
Psychologists say most fears are learned. We are born with only two instinctive fears: fear of loud noises and fear of being dropped. I had a fear of being mauled by Chucky back in the first grade, but I got over it. I decided that I wasn’t going to wait until I felt brave—I just acted brave, and in the end I was brave!
Even as adults we create fearful fantasies that simply don’t match up to reality. This explains why fear is often described as “False Evidence Appearing Real.” We become so focused on our fears that they become real to us—and as a result, we let them control us.
It’s hard to imagine someone as big and successful as Michael Jordan being afraid. Yet during his induction into the NBA Hall of Fame, Jordan talked openly about how he often used his fears to drive himself to be a better athlete. At the conclusion of his speech, he said,
“One day you might look up and see me playing the game at fifty. Oh, don’t laugh, don’t laugh. Never say never. Because limits, like fears, are often just an illusion.”
Jordan may have been a better basketball player than life coach, but he had a point. Follow the Jordan rules; recognize that fears are not real and soar past them, or put them to use. The key to dealing with your worst fears, whether it is fear of flying, fear of failing, or fear of relationships, is to recognize that the fear is not real. It is an emotion, and you can control your response to your emotions.
I had to learn this lesson early in my speaking career. I was very fearful and nervous. I did not know how people would respond to what I had to say. I wasn’t sure they’d even listen to me. Fortunately, my first speaking engagements were to my fellow students. They knew me, and we were comfortable with each other. Over time I began speaking to larger youth groups and churches with only a few friends sprinkled into the crowd. Gradually I overcame my nervousness and fears.
I still experience fear when I am called to speak to many thousands of people, sometimes tens and hundreds of thousands. I go into remote areas of China, South America, Africa, and other parts of the world where I have no idea how people will receive me. I’m afraid I’ll tell a joke that means something entirely different in their culture and they’ll take offense. I use that fear to remind myself to always run my speeches by my interpreters and hosts before I risk embarrassment.
I’ve learned to welcome my fear as a source of energy and as a tool to focus my preparations. If I’m afraid of forgetting my speech or messing something up, it helps me concentrate on reviewing and practicing my presentation.
Many fears are useful in that way. For example, it is a good fear that motivates you to snap on the seat belt because you don’t want to be injured in a car accident. If your fear of catching a cold or a flu inspires you to wash your hands and take vitamins, that’s good too.
Too often, though, we allow our learned fears to run amok. Instead of simply taking precautions to avoid catching a flu or cold, some people take it to an extreme by locking themselves in their homes and refusing to go outdoors. When our fears keep us from doing all we can do or from being all we can be, they are not reasonable.
“WHAT IF?” FEARS
I have a friend whose parents divorced when she was young. Her mum and dad fought all the time, even after they broke up. Now she is a grown woman, but she is afraid to get married. “I don’t want to end up like my parents,” she says.
Can you imagine never having a lasting relationship because you are afraid it might not work out? That’s a sick fear! You can’t think of marriage as nothing but the first step to divorce. Remember the Tennyson poem “ ’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all”?
You can’t possibly have an enjoyable and fulfilling life if you are paralyzed by fear of what might happen someday, somewhere, maybe, somehow. If we all stayed in our beds every day because we were afraid of being struck by lightning or bitten by a malaria mosquito, it would be a pretty sad world, wouldn’t it?
So many fearful people focus on the What if when they should be saying Why not?
What if I fail?
What if I’m not good enough?
What if they laugh at me?
What if I’m turned down?
What if I can’t keep up with my successes?
I understand that sort of thinking. Growing up I had to deal with major fears—the fear of rejection, the fear of inadequacy, the fear of being dependent. It wasn’t just my imagination: my body lacked the standard equipment. But my parents told me that I should always focus not on what was missing but on what I had and what I could create if I only dared to follow my imagination.
“Dream big, Nicky, and never let fear keep you from working toward your dreams,” they said. “You can’t let fear dictate your future. Choose the life you want and go for it.”
So far, I’ve spoken to diverse audiences in more than nineteen countries around the globe. I’ve taken my message of hope and faith to vast crowds in stadiums, arenas, schools, churches, and prisons. I never could have done that if my parents had not encouraged me to acknowledge my fears and then push past them.
FEAR AS MOTIVATION
You and I will never be as dominant in a sport as Michael Jordan was, but you can be like Mike in using fear as a motivational tool to keep chasing your dreams and the life you want to create.
Laura Gregory was a very smart school friend. I could always count on her to say exactly what she was thinking. She did not mess around. One day in our first year, Laura asked, “So you have a teacher’s aide to help you at school. But who takes care of you at home?”
“Well, my parents do,” I said, though I wasn’t certain what she was getting at.
“Are you okay with that?”
“With my parents helping me? Sure, what else would I do?”
“I mean with things like getting dressed and showering and using the bathroom?” she said. “What about your dignity? Don’t you think it’s a little weird that you can’t do that on your own?”
Laura didn’t mean to hurt my feelings. She was a truth seeker, and she truly wanted to know how I felt about every aspect of my life. But she touched on a sensitive subject. One of my greatest fears growing up was that I was a burden on the people I loved. The thought of being overly dependent on my parents, and on my brother and sister too, was never far from my mind. Sometimes I would wake up at night in a cold sweat, terrorized by the thought of my parents being gone, leaving me dependent on Aaron or Michelle.
That fear was a very real one. Sometimes I was nearly overwhelmed by visions of dependency. Laura’s blunt questions about my dignity helped move me from being tormented by that fear to being motivated by it. Questions about my dependency had always lingered on the edges of my consciousness, but after that day I put them at the forefront of my mind, and I decided to address them aggressively.
If I really put my mind to it, just how independent could I become? Motivated by my fear of burdening my loved ones, I created that mission statement—even though at the time I had not a clue as to what a mission statement was. My fear gave me a driving passion and the strength to push myself. I need to do more for myself. But how?
My parents always assured me that they were there to help me and that they didn’t mind carrying me, lifting me, dressing me, or doing whatever I needed them to do. But it bothered me that I couldn’t even get a drink of water by myself, and someone always had to lift me onto the toilet seat. As I grew older, I naturally wanted more independence, and I wanted to look after myself more. My fear gave me the determination to take action on those desires.
One of the thoughts that really stirred me to action was the image of me being a burden on my brother Aaron once my parents were no longer around. I’d often worried about that because if anybody deserved a normal life, it was my poor little brother. I felt like God owed him that because for most of his life he’d been stuck helping me, living with me, and seeing me get so much attention. Aaron had arms and legs, but in some ways he got the raw end of the deal because he always felt he had to look out for me.
My decision to become more self-sufficient, as much as any concern, was a matter of self-preservation. Laura reminded me that I was still dependent on the kindness and patience of others. I knew that I could not always be so reliant on that. And pride played into it too.
I am fully capable of having a family one day, and I would never want my wife to have to carry me around. I want to have kids and be a good father and a good provider too, so I thought, I need to get out of this wheelchair.
Fear can be your foe, but in this case I made it my friend. I announced to my parents that I wanted to find ways to care for myself. They were, of course, worried at first.
“You don’t have to do that. We’ll make sure you’re always cared for,” they said.
“Mum, Dad, I must do this for you and for me, so let’s put our heads togethe
r and figure this out,” I said.
And we did. In some ways our creative efforts reminded me of the old Swiss Family Robinson movie. Stranded on an island, they all pitch in and devise amazing gadgets for bathing, cooking, and surviving. I know no man is an island, especially a man with no arms and no legs. Maybe I was more like a peninsula, or an isthmus.
My mum the nurse and my dad the handyman first came up with a method for me to shower and shampoo my hair. Dad replaced the round knobs on the shower with levers that I could move with my shoulders. Then mum brought home a hands-free soap dispenser with a foot pump, used by doctors prepping for surgery. We adapted it so I could use it to pump soap and shampoo by stepping on it.
Then my dad and I came up with a design for a plastic holder to mount on the wall for an electric toothbrush. I could turn it on and off by pressing a switch and then brush my teeth by moving back and forth.
I told my parents that I wanted to be able to dress myself, so my mum made shorts with a Velcro strip that I could slip in and out of by myself. Shirt buttons have always been a challenge for me, so we found shirts that I could slip on and off by throwing them over my head and wriggling into them.
My major fear had sent the three of us on a mission that was both challenging and fun as we invented ways for me to be more independent. Remote controls, cell phones, computer keyboards, and remote garage-door openers are a blessing for me because I can operate them with my foot.
Some of the solutions we came up with weren’t exactly high tech. I learned how to turn off our home security alarm using my nose to push the buttons, and I used a golf club wedged between my chin and neck to turn on the lights and open some of the windows in the house.
I won’t go into great detail on it, for obvious reasons, but we also devised some ingenious methods that allowed me to use the restroom by myself. You can see some of our methods and devices on this YouTube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DxlJWJ_WfA. Be assured, there is no restroom footage.