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The student news site of Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, Illinois.

The Daily Eastern News

The student news site of Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, Illinois.

The Daily Eastern News

Life without limbs

Some people think about how hard it would be to live without one arm, or how someone could live with no legs. For Nick Vujicic, he lives every day with neither arms nor legs.

Vujicic spoke about how much he enjoyed life, even without arms and legs.

“Change of heart speaks louder than change of circumstance,” he said.

He talked about how foolish it is to sit and wish or want for things that we don’t really need when if we simply change our hearts, then things aren’t near as bad as we think.

He said God will give everything we need, but the things we want – like arms and legs – are neither here nor there, it’s what we need in our hearts that matters.

Vujicic spoke last night in the packed Grand Ballroom of the Martin Luther King jr. University Union.

Before he started speaking a clip from Vujicic’s video, “Life Without Limbs,” was shown. The clip was about his life both as a child and as an adult. He learned to enjoy life much more than many people with arms and legs.

The room was filled with silence except for the occasional outbursts of laughter at Vujicic’s antics in the clip. As soon as he began speaking, he was full of good humor and joked about scaring people for fun sometimes.

Everyone in the room looked in awe upon some of the things he was capable of in the video. Vujicic likes boating, fishing, swimming, playing sports including soccer, and various other things that people with arms and legs would enjoy.

During the first part of the presentation, Vujicic played a game called “Slappers” with a boy in the audience. The point was for the boy to move his hand before Vujicic could slap it with his foot. The boy lost the game, but Vujicic “let him win” and gave him a copy of each of his two DVDs as a prize.

Toward the end of the presentation Vujicic asked that people come to the front and pray with him and recommit themselves to God. Several people walked up to join him at the stage until about half of those in attendance were in front of him. He then asked that people with prayer requests stand and led everyone in a prayer and was followed by a roar of applause.

“I thought it was a very interesting experience. It was extremely positive,” said senior Jonathan Mattson. “I have had issues, but when you are watching someone else, who has no arms or legs no real way of having a real freedom everything that we consider freedom. He said he overrated stairs and we take stairs for granted.

“We take all of those things for granted. It was inspiring. I guess either atheist or Christian, you have to be bigger than your situation whether that is through God, or that is through some other internal means.”

They started the organization Life Without Limbs about two years ago based in west Los Angeles and partnered with another organization called Joni and Friends. They give wheelchairs around the world to third-world countries and educate churches and organizations for disability awareness.

“Our organization is about Nick sharing his story about being born without arms and legs, and the things he had to endure in regards to going through depression or not finding any meaning to his life, and he reached a point in his life where he did find his meaning and purpose,” said George Miksa, vice president of public relations for Life Without Limbs. “As a partner in this organization with him, I’ve seen first hand that his joy and love for life is real, and he’s accomplished so much already.

“He’s only 24 and he’s got a double major degree in accounting and financial planning. He’s spoken to over a million people already in Africa, India, Indonesia, Cambodia, and the Philippines without any (public relations). It’s just word of mouth.”

Life without limbs

Life without limbs

Nick Vujicic speaks at the University Grand Ballroom Wednesday evening. Vujicic was born without any legs or arms.

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