Just a few inspirational examples of what you can get done if you're willing to expend some sweat.....
Feel free to add your own to this list.
Physical
- Lynn Hill is the only person to free-climb the 3,000-foot Nose route on Yosemite's El Capitan in a single day. (Outside)
- Guy Delage swam across the Atlantic Ocean in 1995. (Outside)
Writing
- Kathleen Lindsay wrote 904 romances.
- Sylvester Stallone turned to writing when he couldn't even get an extra's part in The Godfather. "I became so focused that I painted my windows black. I'd watch a show on television, absorb the best part of it and write a similar scene like a duplicate. I began to understand what drama was. I was very prolific." The story is that he had $106 dollars to his name when he was offered a million dolars for the rights to Rocky. He turned it down, insisting that he play the title role himself. He had a facial nerve damaged during childbirth which paralyzed the left side of his face and became the highest paid actor in movies. (Los Angeles Times)
Learning
- Ruth Lawrence passed her 0 level maths at 9 and A level at 10 (18 is normal) and entered Oxford Univeristy at 12.
- Mehmed Ali Halici quoted 6500 verses of the Koran in 6 hours
Intellectual
- Seymour Papert pioneered the computer language LOGO.
- Francis Collins lead the Human Genome Project. He works 100 hour weeks. He flies more miles in a month than most people do in their lives. He puts decals on his motorcycle helmet for each gene they define. When he was seven he wrote a script for The Wizard of Oz and directed it. He would spend hours contemplating dividing numbers by zero. He graduated from high school at age 16. He has done charity work in Nigeria. (Time Magazine 1994)
Special Abilities
- J.H. Pullen was severely retarded and deaf but a master carver and artist. He once spent 7 years building a ten foot model of a steamship which required him to affix one and one-half million wooden pins and 5,885 rivets.
- Leonardo da Vinci could write with both hands at the same time.
Working
- Van Gogh often turned out a painting per day.
- Ross Perot was the son of an East Texas horse trader. He became an Eagle Scout and Annapolis graduate. In his sales job with IBM, he once filled his annual sales quota in 19 days. He now has assets of $3.3 billion dollars.
Courage
- Stefansson, an Arctic explorer, was known as Softy as a boy.
- Itzhak Perlman is paralyzed from the waist down and yet goes on concert tours as a world-renown violinist. (4th Course of Chicken Soup for the Soul, Canfield)