MESSAGE #327 - THE STORY OF AN ACADEMY AWARD WINNER

Maybe you saw the actor Kirk Douglas on the 1997 Academy Awards telecast. You might remember that he had recently suffered a paralyzing stroke that left him speaking with a pronounced stutter. For some it was a sad sight: the legendary actor, once the pillar of strength, brought low by age and illness, barely able to get words out of his mouth.

But to Douglas’ friends and family, his appearance represented the greatest comeback of his career, because his medical advisers had doubted that he’d ever speak again, much less on national television.

His secret?

Kirk Douglas was able to set a single initial goal and achieve that goal, no matter how long it took.

“The most crippling thing about a stroke is the depression,” he told The Spectator, a London daily newspaper. “When I first had my stroke and couldn’t speak, I wanted to crawl up to bed and cry. And then you get to the point where you say, ‘Enough of the self-pity.’ Then you get to work.”

The first act was honestly assessing his situation.

The second act was setting a single, simple goal.

For Douglas, that goal presented itself in the form of his four-year-old granddaughter. After three months, Douglas couldn’t speak as well as she could. His first goal was to speak as well as a four-year-old. One day, he said the word “transcontinental.” His granddaughter couldn’t say it.

“I knew I was at least moving ahead of a four-year-old,” he says.

His first goal reached, Douglas kept moving forward to bigger, tougher words, until he had resurrected his speech and resumed his life.

“Some people who have strokes just give up,” he says. “And then you have people waiting on you. I try to avoid that. Someone will say to me, ‘Would you like me to get you some water?’ And I say, ‘No, I will get it myself.’ I need to feel self-sufficient, that I am able to do the simple things.”

Think of it: the famous actor, who lives by his ability to speak and act, unable to speak. The famous movie star, so associated with strength, exhibiting a weakness every time he opened his mouth.

Douglas is no different from you and me.

Consider your own weakness, determine an initial goal, then work toward achieving that goal until it’s accomplished.

One goal will lead to another and another, providing you a virtual ladder toward your comeback.

This an excerpt from:
The Gospel of Good Success
by Kirbyjon H. Caldwell
published by Simon & Schuster