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NOTES:
Cliff Devries isn’t your stereotypical diving coach.
Sure, he’s got the pedigree. 17 years as the diving coach for RIT Tigers. Eight All-Americans. The first diving coach to receive the prestigious Richard E. Steadman Award by the College Swimming and Diving Coaches Association of America…
He started diving when he was a freshman at Rush-Henrietta Senior High School in New York, and his natural talent earned him a scholarship to the University of Kentucky.
From there, he set his sights on the Olympics. But training started to go stall out. He realized his shoulder wasn’t as strong as it used to be. He seemed to be going backward, not forward.
Unable to perform, he lost his scholarship.
Then the doctors gave him the bad news:
“Cliff, you’re going to die. You’ve got a 6-inch tumor in your spinal cord.”
Cliff says, “It took the breath out of me … All these plans of a future, a family — everything was wiped away. It was gut-wrenching.”
Cliff was just 21 years old. Surgery was supposed to remove 90% of his tumor. After working on him for 13 hours, though, he was completely paralyzed from the neck down.
Frustrated, he got tired of hearing that he couldn’t or wouldn’t be able to do the things he wanted to do. He decided he’d do whatever it took to regain whatever he could.
After years of therapy, Cliff did manage to recover function on his left side. He became a diving coach, but unlike other coaches, he couldn’t show his students what to do. He missed that split second between the dive and the water.
So on October 30, 2019 — his 46th birthday — he decided to take a dive.
“You are not going to find a lot of beauty in what I do, but it’s a lot of hard work, it’s a lot of emotions and it’s all balled up into a little half-second fall into the water,” he said.
What a way to celebrate!
Here’s what I want you to take away from this…
Overcomers Keep Going No Matter What
Let’s talk about what it takes to face down crises and hardships… and win.
1. Realize, your situation doesn’t define you.
- it’s not a punishment from the universe
- it didn’t happen because you need to learn a lesson
- bad things happen to all of us
2. Accept the reality of what happened.
- like Alcoholics Anonymous — you can’t fix something that isn’t real
- after my injury: “She can walk!” No! I was seriously disabled.
- positivity can’t whitewash the truth
- Some challenges can’t be overcome. They need to be adapted to.
3. Visualize your best life in your new reality.
- adapt as necessary – computer in bed
- find ways to be happy
- find new ways of doing things, so you succeed where you are
4. Don’t settle. Always push the limits of what’s possible.
- best diagnostician in Texas: Stem cell is a waste of money.”
- “you’ll never walk again”
- “you’ll never get off these meds
- do the hard work of healing
5. Nourish your mind and body.
- your body is constantly renewing itself. Give it what it needs to heal.
- hope, don’t expect
- stress takes you down. Peace
- positive energy. Self-work
6. Celebrate what you CAN do.
- your value doesn’t lie in what you do or achieve
- you don’t have anything to prove yourself, your faith, your intelligence, or your strength
- overcoming is for you
- never accept defeat. Push for the win. YOUR win.
