Impossible is nothing?

If you can dream it, you can become it". Albert Einstein.

Today is not an opinion post. Today I have collected some real stories of people like you and me, which show that human being is capable to do whatever he wants. Nowadays we are living a crucial moment in our history. Is the time of taking important decisions which will condition our future and the future of our sons and. We have to be confident in the goodness of human being and in the convincement that a better world is possible if anyone make a bit effort to support it and if we attack directly the origin of the problems. Temporally solutions are not solutions.

Albert Einstein was a solitary child who repeated sentences obsessively until he was seven, and read in a very confusing, which caused him problems at school. Anecdotally his Greek professor came to say "you will never become to anything''. Einstein did not pass his entrance exam at university. He passed science and math but suspended other areas as history, languages ​​and geography. He had to attend to individual classes and conduct a further examination to enter university. He Received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics "for his service to Theoretical Physics, and especially for historical discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect". Because relativity was still considered somewhat controversial, it was officially bestowed for his explanation of the photoelectric effect.

The next love story began in Winchester, 43 years ago, when Rick was strangled by the umbilical cord during birth, leaving him brain-damaged and unable to control his limbs.

"He'll be a vegetable the rest of his life'' Dick (his father) says doctors told him and his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. ''Put him in an Institution''.

But the Hoyts weren't buying it. They noticed the way Rick's eyes followed them around the room. When Rick was 11 they took him to the engineering department at Tufts University and asked if there was anything to help the boy communicate. ''No way,'' Dick says he was told. ''There's nothing going on in his brain''.

"Tell him a joke,'' Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a lot was going on in his brain. Rigged up with a computer that allowed him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his Head, Rick was finally able to communicate. After a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the School organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, ''Dad, I want to do that''.

Yeah, right. How was Dick, a self-described ''porker'' who never ran more than a mile at a time, going to push his son five miles? Still, he tried. ''Then it was me who was handicapped,'' Dick says. ''I was sore for two weeks''.

That day changed Rick's life. ''Dad,'' he typed, ''when we were running, It felt like I wasn't disabled anymore!''.

And that sentence changed Dick's life. He became obsessed with giving Rick that feeling as often as he could. He got into such hard-belly shape that he and Rick were ready to try the 1979 Boston marathon.

''No way,'' Dick was told by a race official. The Hoyts weren't quite a single runner, and they weren't quite a wheelchair competitor. For a few years Dick and Rick just joined the massive field and ran anyway, then they found a way to get into the race officially: In 1983 they ran another marathon so fast they made the qualifying time for Boston the following year.

Then somebody said, ''Hey, Dick, why not a triathlon?''

How's a guy who never learned to swim and hadn't ridden a bike since he was six going to haul his 110-pound kid through a triathlon? Still, Dick Tried. Now they've done 212 triathlons.

At ages 65 and 43, Dick and Rick finished their 24th Boston Marathon, in 5,083rd place out of more than 20,000 starters. Their best time? Two hours, 40 minutes in 1992--only 35 minutes off the world Record, which, in case you don't keep track of these things, happens to be held by a guy who was not pushing another man in a wheelchair at the Time.

''No question about it,'' Rick types. '' My dad is the Father of the Century.''

And Dick got something else out of all this too. Two years ago he had a mild heart attack during a race. Doctors found that one of his arteries was 95% clogged. ''If you hadn't been in such great shape,'' one doctor told him, ''you probably would've died 15 years ago.'' So, in a way, Dick and Rick saved each other's life.

  

Baler was a village of 2000 inhabitants located in the Province of Nueva Écija, in the East of Philippines, in a mountainous field that was hindering its communication with Manila and with the rest of the province. Its main access was by sea. In February of 1898 arrived to Baler the Spanish captain D. Enrique de las Moreras, as political commander of the District.  With him arrived 50 soldiers of the 2nd Rifles Battalion.

At the beginning of April of 1898, bursts the revolt Tagalog again in the province.Little by little they went falling into the Spanish posts and Baler remains isolated and without possibility from receiving orders or military communications. However the inhabitants of Baler were maintaining a normal activity without revolt symptoms.

In June, before the imminence of the assault, the troops were installed in the Church that was a stone and masonry building located in a defensible position. The day 30 of June, some soldiers tried to accomplish an output but they found a strong resistance being withdrawn to the Church. Here started the spot of Baler that it can be split into three stages.

In the first phase, Philippine forces attacked Spanish troops from far, with musketry fire, and invoked them the surrender. Spanish forces refused the offer. 

In The second phase Philippine forces were composed by some 800 Philippine soldiers, with 6 cannons which started the bombardment of the Church. August 7 the Phlilipines attempt an assault by surprise to ignite the building, allocating a staircase in a field of few visibility but they were discovered by a sentry and rejected with quite killed. The foods were sparing and the diseases were causing several killed, among them.

Among 14 of January of 1899 and the end of the spot is developed the third phase in the one which the Philippines invoked the Spanish officers help to convince the garrison of the end of the war and of the loss of the Spanish sovereignty. Spanish shipped several officers that were interviewed by the Lieutenant Martín Cerezo, communicating him the Spanish Philippines withdrawal but, in spite of the lack of official documents, the garrison believed that they were fraudulent.  Meanwhile, the Philippines attempt to take several times the Church being repulsed by the Spanish forces. In March grew the gunner bombardments, with void efficiency. The status in the interior of the Church was almost despaired. 29 of May of 1899, was presented the Spanish lieutenant colonel Aguilar that invoked to the Lieutenant Martín the surrender, indicating to him that, Philippines no longer were Spanish sovereignty and delivery to him some Spanish newspapers to confirm the news. The Lieutenant Martín doubted of the veracity of the same and refused to be yielded.

June, 1 of 1899,  wile he was preparing the attempt of exit for the next day, the lieutenant Martín read a new in one of the newspapers that had let to him the lieutenant colonel Aguilar referred to a friend of him. It convinced to him of the fact that the war had terminated and that the Philippines no longer were Spanish colony. The day 2 of June of 1899, a year afterwards of the beginning of the fence, were yielded to the Philippines the garrison of Baler. 

Thirty and two men, of the fifty and seven that started the defense, were evacuated toward Spain in the middle of the honors made by the Philippines and the Americans.

Helen Keller at the age of 19 months was a happy, healthy child. She was already saying a few words. Then she had a high fever which caused her to become deaf and blind. No longer could she see nor hear. She felt lost. She would hang on to her mother's skirt to get around. She would feel of people's hands to try to find out what they were doing. She learned to do many things this way. She learned to milk a cow and knead the bread dough.

She could recognize people by feeling of their faces or their clothes.

She made up signs with her hands so she could "talk" to her family. She had 60 different signs. If she wanted bread, she pretended to be cutting a loaf. If she wanted ice cream, she would hug her shoulders and shiver.

Helen was a very bright child. She became very frustrated because she couldn't talk. She became very angry and began to throw temper tantrums. The family knew they had to do something to help her.

They found a teacher named Anne Sullivan. Miss Sullivan herself had been blind, but had an operation and regained her sight. She understood what Helen was feeling. She taught Helen the signs for the letters of the alphabet. Then she would "spell" the words in Helen's hand to communicate with her.

One day Anne led Helen to the water pump and pumped water on her hand. She spelled the letters W-A-T-E-R as the water ran over Helen's hand. She did this over and over again. At last it dawned on Helen that the word "water" meant the water which she felt pouring over her hand. This opened up a whole new world for her. She ran everywhere asking Anne the name of different things and Anne would spell the words in her hand. This was the key which unlocked the world for her.

She eventually stopped having the tantrums. Anne taught her for years. Helen learned to read Braille. This was a system of raised dots representing letters. A blind person could read by feeling of the dots.

When she went to college, her teacher Anne went with her and tapped out the words of the instructors into her student's hand.

Helen had an amazing memory, and she also had skills very few people have ever been able to develop. She could put her fingers to a person's lips and understand the words which were being spoken.

While she was in college she wrote her book called "The Story of My Life". With the money she earned from the book she was able to buy a house.

She became famous and traveled around the world speaking to groups of people. She met many important and well-known people as she traveled.

The New York Stock Exchange crashed on October 24, 1929, spreading panic among the world's financial markets. The already weakened Japanese economy was thrown into disarray. Prices plummeted, employee rolls were slashed throughout the country, and many factories were closed.

Panasonic sales declined, and by the end of December its warehouses were over flowing with unsold stock. Company executives could see no solution other than staff cutbacks, but the President and founder of the company, Matsushita, told them, "Cut production by half starting now, but do not dismiss even a single employee. We'll halve production not by laying off workers, but having them work only half days. We will continue to pay the same wages they are getting now, but there will be no holidays. All employees should do their best to sell inventory."

Matshushita met to his employees and explained the situation, informing them that there were not dismissals, but they have to concentrate in sell the inventory. Employees threw themselves into the sales effort with fierce determination. Within two months, the excess inventories were gone and demand had recovered, allowing full-scale production to resume.

At the beginning of January 1931, the company celebrated its first shipment of the year to throw off the despair of the depression-a tradition that lasted up until 1965.

 

In 1938, Karoly Takacs of the Hungarian Army, was the top pistol shooter in the world. He was expected to win the gold in the 1940 Olympic Games scheduled for Tokyo.

Those expectations vanished one terrible day just months before the Olympics. While training with his army squad, a hand grenade exploded in Takacs’ right hand, and Takacs’ shooting hand was blown off.

Takacs spent a month in the hospital depressed at both the loss of his hand, and the end to his Olympic dream. At that point most people would have quit. And they would have probably spent the rest of their life feeling sorry for themselves. Most people would have quit but not Takacs.

Takacs did the unthinkable; he picked himself up, dusted himself off, and decided to learn how to shoot with his left hand! His reasoning was simple. He simply asked himself, “Why not?”

Instead of focusing on what he didn’t have – a world class right shooting hand, he decided to focus on what he did have – incredible mental toughness, and a healthy left hand that with time, could be developed to shoot like a champion.

For months Takacs practiced by himself. No one knew what he was doing. Maybe he didn’t want to subject himself to people who most certainly would have discouraged him from his rekindled dream.

In the spring of 1939 he showed up at the Hungarian National Pistol Shooting Championship. Other shooters approached Takacs to give him their condolences and to congratulate him on having the strength to come watch them shoot. They were surprised when he said, “I didn’t come to watch, I came to compete.” They were even more surprised when Takacs won!

The 1940 and 1944 Olympics were cancelled because of World War II. It looked like Takacs’ Olympic Dream would never have a chance to realize itself. But Takacs kept training and in 1944 he qualified for the London Olympics. At the age of 38, Takacs won the Gold Medal and set a new world record in pistol shooting. Four years later, Takacs won the Gold Medal again at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics.