“Never underestimate the power of dreams and the influence of the human spirit. We are all the same in this notion: The potential for greatness lives within each of us.” Wilma Rudolph
Born in 1940, Wilma Rudolph’s life started with challenges that would keep many people isolated in a lifelong prison of self-pity and despair. As if being born 4 months premature, with one leg shorter than the other, were not enough, at age 4 Wilma contracted double pneumonia and scarlet fever. Wilma’s mother spent the next several years nursing her through one illness after another: measles, mumps, and chicken pox.
When she was 6 years old, her family discovered that her left leg and foot had become weak and deformed. She was taken to the doctor where it was discovered she had contracted the crippling disease of polio. In those days there was no cure for polio and she was told she would never walk again. For two years her mother and other family members spent their time massaging her leg and taking her twice a week for physical therapy some 50 miles away from home.
At age 8 Wilma was fitted with a leg brace enabling her to walk to school like the other children. It was then she discovered her love for sports. She could usually be found spending her afternoons shooting baskets with her 19 brothers and sisters. Through her “never say quit” attitude, Wilma never allowed her disability keep her from having fun. The daily exercise proved to be not only pleasurable but good therapy as well. At age 12 she was able to discard her leg brace and walk and run normally.
Undaunted by her lifelong health struggles, Wilma went on to become an outstanding student athlete in both high school and college. Her love for running led her to track and field. In 1956, as a 16 year old high school student, she competed in her first Olympics where she won the bronze medal in the 400 yard relay. She returned to the Olympics in 1960, where she became the first American woman to win 3 gold medals in one Olympics, setting one world record on the way.
With all the setbacks and challenges she faced as a child growing up, how was she able to accomplish what she accomplished?
As a young girl facing all these difficulties, her mother always encouraged her by singing songs to her about God’s love, and telling her that God had created her to do something special in life. It was during these times that Wilma began to dream of doing something great and actually believe she would. She worked hard at overcoming her setbacks and disabilities. She worked hard at developing her athletic skills. She believed that regardless of what she had experienced, and what she had gone through, through faith in God and hard work, her best days were ahead of her.
In life we all face things that can break us or make us, cause us to become bitter or drive us to be better. The choice as to whom we become and what we accomplish is ours. One of my favorite Ann Landers quotes is, “Our background and circumstances may have influenced who we are, but we are responsible for who we become."
Maybe you’ve experienced a setback such as, the loss of a job, health problems, divorce, rejection of friends, mistakes you’ve made, etc. Perhaps you feel like the guy I was playing golf with one day. He couldn’t hit a good shot or make a putt all day. By the time we got to the 14th hole he was so frustrated and negative, he started talking to himself or anyone that would listen. It culminated in him declaring, “If it weren’t for bad luck, I wouldn’t have any luck at all,” and then throwing his clubs as far as he could throw them, and storming off the course!
In my 50 years of life I have discovered that life isn’t always fair. As the scripture says, “It rains on the just and the unjust alike!” Things don’t always go as we would like them to go. Sometimes we feel like the Old Testament Patriarch Job, who said, “Mans days are short and full of trouble.” If anyone knew that truth, he did. In one fell swoop he lost everything he had, including his health. However, what’s interesting about Job is, he never quit believing for better days, even when his wife and friends encouraged him to do so. The Bible says he maintained his integrity towards God, maintained his faith in a better day, and in the end God blessed him by restoring double all he had lost.
Regardless of what you have experienced in the past, you’ve got to believe your best days are ahead of you. History is filled with two types of people, those who give up when the going gets tough, and those who refuse to quit. You can read the accounts of the lives of those who kept on keeping on; no one remembers much about the ones that quit.
Your best days are ahead of you. Days of success and not failure. Days of abundance and not lack. Days of health and not sickness. Days of purpose and not confusion. Days of joy and not pain. But, you say, “You don’t understand how tough things are for me right now.” Maybe not, but this I do know to be true, if you can believe for better days, and diligently work towards them, you will begin to experience them. Jesus taught, “I you can believe, all things are possible to him that believes.” The first step to enjoying the better days that are ahead of you is simply believing they are yours.
Action Steps:
- 1. What setbacks have you allowed to stop your forward momentum?
- 2. How is your faith? What do you really believe for?
- 3. What steps can you take to begin to overcome the setbacks and negative circumstances in your life?
- 4. Decide today to spend at least 30 minutes a day reading or listening to inspiring stories of others that have faced similar circumstances as you, and how they overcame.
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