Described as “strikingly free of bitterness,” Dury said, “I’m 56, and I’ve probably had more fun and games than most people my age. I’ve had a good run. Musn’t grumble.”

Also making list was DAVID BLUNKETT, Britain’s Home Secretary, who is blind. He is often photographed with his guide dogs, Ted, Offa and Lucy.

Did you know that JIM ABBOTT, (1967-present), has no right hand. A major league baseball pitcher, he won Golden Spikes Award as finest amateur baseball player in US, played on 1988 U.S. Olympic Baseball team and pitched a gold medal for US team. He played baseball for California Angels and was traded to New York Yankees.

BLIND LEMON JEFFERSON [Lemon Jefferson Couchman], 1897-1929, blind from childhood, was most popular male blues recording artist of 1920s, making over 100 recordings last four years of his life.

At age of 13, WANG XUEFENG, who lives in Heilongjiang Province in China, began music training, although wheelchair-bound due to congenital osteomalacia. Four years laters he won Instrumental Music, Special honor, and Newcomer Awards at State Art performance of Disabled Persons.

HIKARI OE was born with a potentially fatal cranial deformity and went on to become a recognized composer of classical music. His first two CDS (Music of Hikari Oe and Music of Hikari Oe 2) have been best-sellers in his native Japan, with 300,000 sold worldwide.

NOT QUALIFIED?

SIR DOUGLAS BADER was continually told there was no regulation allowing someone in his condition to fly.

A World War II ace, in his youth, as member of Royal Air Force, Sir Douglas Bader sustained a flying accident that left him a double amputee and was discharged. Determined to not only walk again, but fly again, he eventually was reinstated when WWII broke out and experienced pilots were needed.

A skillful pilot as well as an inspirational leader, he was awarded Distinguished Services Order and Distinguised Flying Cross for leadership and valor in action.

MORE

Compiled by Alliance for Citizens with Disabilities Hillsborough County, Fla and The Mayor’s Alliance for Persons with Disabilities Tampa, Florida, here are some famous individuals who have suffered from disabilities. For complete list go here, http://www.tampagov.net/dept_Mayor/Mayors_Alliance/famous_persons/index.asp

BIPOLAR 1.Ned Beatty, actor 2.Ludwig von Beethoven, composer 3.Art Buchwald, columnist 4.Tim Burton, actor 5.Robert Campeau, Canadian financier 6.Lewis Carroll, author of “Through Looking Glass” 7.Dick Cavettm comedian and talk show host

EPILEPSY

1.Napoleon Bonaparte, Emperor of France 2.Richard Burton, actor 3.Marion Clignet, cyclist, 1996 Olympic silver medal winner 4.Dante, Italian write, author of “The Inferno” 5.Leonardo Da Vinci, painter, artist, sculptor, painted Sistine Chapel 6.Fyodor Dostoyevski, Russian author, “The Brother Karamazov” and “Crime and Punishment” 7.Alexander Great, 356-323 BC, King of Macedonians and conquieror of much of known world at time

Whatever your situation, don’t let it get you down and keep you down! If you need support, hire a coach and work on your emotional intelligence competencies. Resilience means being able to bounce back from adversity, setbacks and losses and includes being “strikingly free of bitterness.”

And draw inspiration from others who have had to live with hard things.

Whenever I read stories like these, I am humbled and look at things differently. I hope you'll be inspired too.

Iran, with seventy per cent of its population, thirty years and younger, is ripe for such an event. Young people, not yet ready to oppose presumed authority, as U.S. youth were not in beginning, are defying edicts of authority. This is a healthy, pre revolutionary development.

Iranian youth are exploring Internet and forming rock bands in basements and listening to music from other cultures. This is very much like what happened in England.

If it is spirit of music that is critical agent for change, Iranian youth should be introduced to early American Rock and Roll, to find and know that spirit. I would say first five years, from 1956 through 1960. Then include Blues music from course of its history, acoustic and electric, to make connection of musical expression of oppressed people and obvious connection to Rock and Roll. Can it be music of oppressed that leads to liberation in ways a foreign army never does?

If Iranian youth are encouraged to listen to early U.S. Rock and Blues, their social and cultural revolution can be much less violent than without this old music. Feel good music somehow creates better judgement for exuberant youth. They begin to weigh happiness they feel against consequences of political action and civil disobedience. It tempers need to act from hate, which blinds one to opportunities for progression.

What if it is Iranian youth who produce new Beatles that spread a happy revolution, not only throughout Middle East, but around world? Could they not rekindle that spirit for those of us who now only know it as a distant memory? Wouldn't it be wonderful if music of Iranian youth does for world what U.S. foreign policy fails to do in Iraq? The spirit of modern Rock music is not same. It does not generate hope in oppressed. It is a mistake to think all Rock music is same and will produce same result. I have not listened to that old Rock and Roll much since sixties. Maybe I should have. Maybe I will now.