"Life is lived forward, but understood backward. It is not until we are down the road and we stand on the mountain looking back through the valley that we can appreciate the terrain God has allowed us to scale.” Jill Savage

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Inspirational People Week -Carlie - Opens the World of Autism

Remember - It is one of the most beautiful compensations of life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein to be content.
-Helen Keller


"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world." ~ Anne Frank

"What about Richard Pimentel -he began his life as a fighter, and his life’s work becomes a process of fighting for the rights of others.
Rising up from a childhood in a dysfunctional family, armed with a talent for public speaking and a winning personality, the young man makes his way to a Northwestern college, confident that he will ace his try-out for his idol Dr. Ben Padrow, the coach of the winningest team in the history of the College Bowl.
But Dr. Padrow shatters his dream when he rejects him. Richard’s immediate reaction is to enlist in the army for a tour of duty in Vietnam. During combat, the young recruit loses his hearing to a bomb blast, and has to deal with this new found disability on his return to civilian life in Oregon.

Richard discovers that his disability and the struggle to transcend it is a defining moment in his fight for what he believes in. When he tries to help his friends, vets like himself and others with disabilities, to get work in an environment that treats them with pity at best and disdain as a matter of course, he realizes that he can make a difference.

The friends who make up his close-knit clique are: Art Honneyman, a student wheel chair user with cerebral palsy who uses his rapier wit to deflect the prejudice that greets his disturbing appearance; Mike Stoltz, a fellow veteran with a lot of rage and nowhere to put it; and then there is Christine, the passionate libertine who strokes Richard’s ego and initiates him into the world of free love.

Together, the friends experience the currents of those turbulent times, and the wild, joyful energy of winning through confrontation and humor. Without his hearing Richard is all the more prepared to listen to the message deep within himself, and to carry that message to the thousands of people whose lives are improved by the movement he helps to organize."

The movie is awesome - a true story about a Viet Nam Hero.

And what about Carlie - An autistic girl learns to speak and shares with the world how autistic children REALLY feel.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQ9GGsDAcgA&feature=email

Do you have other inspirational people you can think of you;d like to share? I know there are many others I've forgotten . . .

What about Helen Keller, Anne Frank, C.S. Lewis, Christopher Reeves and his wife Dana, Paul Newman, Maya Angelou, Lance Armstrong, Jamie Lee Curtis, Willie Mays, Danny Thomas, Yogi Berra and the list goes on. . .

Love,
Chatty

And here's one for you - what about yourself - warts and all. Even when you make mistakes, jump to conclusions, make wrong judgements, want things you can't have, get misguided - anything wrong - as long as your out there trying - learning - self correcting - you're an inspiration too.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very inspirational Qoutes indeed.

JeanMac said...

I love your cartoon!