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Overcoming Adversity With Helen Keller
Episode 57th May 2022 • The Daily Podcast with Jonathan Doyle • Jonathan Doyle
00:00:00 00:06:03

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Helen Keller is truly one of the remarkable figures of history. She is an incredible example of how a person can overcome the most intense adversity to make something remarkable of her life. It's time to reflect upon what we can learn from her incredible existence.

Grab your free copy of my book Bridging The Gap here:

https://go.jonathandoyle.co/btg-pdf

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Hi guys, Jonathan Doyle with you.

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Once again, welcome back to today's message.

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Please make sure you've subscribed.

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Hit that subscribe button.

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And if you haven't grabbed a copy of my free book bridging the gap link is below.

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I've got it in an awesome PDF format going to send your chapter every two days.

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You're going to absolutely love it.

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Short chapters, really easy to work through.

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That's the book that started it all for Mesa.

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Grab a free copy underneath.

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You're ready to go.

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Let's do this today.

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We are going to be sharing a quote from the incredible Helen Keller.

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If you're not familiar with her story.

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Lost her ability to basically communicate her eyesight, her speech

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at the age of about 19 months.

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And you see this incredible journey where she just went on to become

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one of the great figures of history.

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Somebody very familiar with suffering.

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I'll put a link to her bio here today, so you can go and

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check her out credible story.

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But the quote I want to share with you today from her is really powerful.

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Let's do it.

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Character cannot be developed in ease and.

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Only through experience of trial and suffering.

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Can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired and success achieved?

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How often do we find ourselves here?

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Listening to me talk about the way that I think the universe is structured

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a few days ago, I was talking about this with a quote from Alfred Adler.

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Some of you would remember that.

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We are a culture created for comfort.

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We're a culture where you can pretty much just get through

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life without too much difficulty.

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You can innate the ties, the pain in your life through any number of substances.

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You can distract yourself with any number of entertainments, but it's same as that.

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The ability to grow in our souls, in our character, in the essence of who

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we are, doesn't come through ease.

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Not many of us become extraordinary people by sitting on the couch.

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Those of us who really try and develop the raw material of what we've been

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given often have to do it by pushing against some pretty big obstacles.

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Those obstacles could be psychological.

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They could be relational, they could be physical.

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There could be professional, but it's the ability to encounter

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difficulty and suffering and push.

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That somehow leads those of us who want to do it into a different experience of

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reality, a different experience of life.

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And I think what happens with suffering and difficulty is it either breaks

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you and makes you bitter and you start looking for a cause and you

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start looking for someone to blame.

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You start looking for someone who's responsible for why?

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Well, I mean, how much is that a thing at the moment?

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Right?

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Our culture, a political culture particularly is predicated on this

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idea that somewhere there is someone to blame that somewhere there is.

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Who is responsible for why you are unhappy and if you vote for them, they're

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going to make things better for you.

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I mean, look, how's that working out as a global culture, you know, like,

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do we seem to be a more adjusted, happy, balanced, tolerant patient

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loving, you know, developing world right at the moment, the time of

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recording this, it's not looking at.

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There might be a place for governments to help, uh, deal with terrible injustices.

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But outside of that, this idea that someone outside ourselves

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can magically fix our lives for us is I think really, probably.

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Gandy used to say this, right.

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You know, be the change that you want to see.

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Do you want to change the world?

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Well, it's a good place to start and it's not necessarily in the political process.

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I've got a real issue with it.

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I think, you know, my kids are always asking me, what do

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you think of this politician?

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What do you think of that one?

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I said, I think that, I think what I think of every single politician

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that the human, that there'll be some that are better than others.

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There'll be some that are slightly better than others,

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but many of them will be broken.

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Complex people like all of us.

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So I think one of the things we need to do is stop looking for

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salvation in the political process.

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Stop looking for salvation in some kind of outside force.

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What we need to do is realize that the difficulties and strains and struggles

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of our relationships, our work, our physical bodies, uh, invitations

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to the duke growth and development.

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And we don't go looking for it, doing we, most of us don't we just

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want to kind of get through each day relatively similar to the one before it.

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But if you want a different result, you have to do different things.

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You have to seek out some difficult things.

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You have to push yourself when you don't feel like it.

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I've been saying in recent episodes that I'm currently coaching a

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sporting team and you can see it.

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You can see it in real time.

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You can see a group of X number of people, and there are some who want

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to push and some who want to grow.

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And it's a mystery.

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It really is a mystery, but all I can say to you today, as you

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watch this, if you are watching.

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I want to put the thought in your head that it's the hard things in

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your life at the moment that have the opportunity to grow and develop.

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If you can face them, push through them, accept them.

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Be decent in them.

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Be a good human in the midst of suffering.

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Avoid blame and rage and judgment operate in acceptance and invitation

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that, yes, this is difficult, but I am going to grow through it.

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That's your choice.

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You can choose that option.

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That's the part that is you in your power.

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That's the part that our culture is telling us is not in our power, but it

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is the ability to choose our response.

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I mean, it's difficult circumstances.

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Helen Keller could have just caught up in a bowl.

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And never grown, but her ability to face terrible hardship and

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suffering led her to become one of the great figures of history.

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So make sure you check out her biography below.

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All right friends.

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That's it from me.

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Let's get into character.

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Let's get into growth.

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Let's get into acceptance.

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Let's accept the invitation of hardship.

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Let's accept the invitation of difficulty it's growing the process.

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Make sure you've subscribed my name's Jonathan Doyle.

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I'm going to have another message for you tomorrow.

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