Stumbling block or stepping stone?

By Varuna Ratnaweera

Rashmi Nimesha

Suranga Udari

A visually handicapped old man was walking along a gravel road with the assistance of his white cane.

He was feeling the path with his cane for guidance when he came across a huge concrete slab, which would certainly have tripped and made him fall face down on the road if he did not feel the presence of it with his walking stick.

He paused, gauged the obstruction with his walking stick, moved his right leg closer to it, climbed on it, dragged his left foot on to it slowly, walked across it while still touching the surface of the concrete slab with his walking stick till he came to the edge to slowly get off with much care before continuing to walk forward.

The old man was not deterred by the stumbling block but he really made it a stepping stone to continue on his journey.

Don’t we all come across stumbling blocks in our journey of life at some point or the other?

What do we do at times like that?

Sometimes we get really disheartened and almost stop our journey, lose focus on our goals.

Spend hours, days and weeks repenting about what happened to us without thinking of alternatives to overcome the obstacle and move forward.

The world has experienced so many stories about famous personalities who had shrugged off their difficulties and setbacks to become successful in their own way.

Thomas Alva Edison is supposed to have tried and failed a whole lot of times (though it is not confirmed whether it was 1,000 times or more) before he successfully invented the light bulb. His reaction to his several attempts before success came his way, has been, “I have not failed. I just found 1,000 ways that won’t work.”

The 32nd President of the United States Franklin D. Roosevelt is said to have developed polio at the age of 39, which had left him paralysed from waist down for the rest of his life. Even though he couldn’t walk and had a weakened image he decided to contest the governorship of New York. He later went on to lead the country as one of the most respected and memorable presidents in history.

It is known that Albert Einstein didn’t speak until he was four years old and that he didn’t have the best childhood. Many of his teachers thought he was lazy and wouldn’t make any progress in life. Van Gogh who is considered one of the greatest artists of all time, has been able to sell only one painting the entire time he was alive: ‘The Red Vineyard at Arles (The Vigne Rouge)’ and that painting is now in the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow.

This list can go on and on, but the most recent local example is that of Rashmi Nimesha from Eheliyagoda, the girl who passed the GCE Advanced Level examination with three A’s having used her left toes to write the answers because she has been handicapped without both her arms and also the right leg. Rashmi’s is a remarkably inspiring story as she had also won a gold medal at the Global IT Challenge tournament, in Vietnam in September 2017.

In August last year (2021) it was reported that a 32-year-old Sri Lankan lady Suranga Udari from Galle had fulfilled her dream of becoming a journalist and was recognised as Sri Lanka’s first female reporter to use sign language on camera to produce a news story on the improper disposal of face masks on the southern beach of Galle. USAID reported, “After completing her formal education, Suranga could not find employment in any of the local media houses. She had two options: watch her childhood dream shatter into pieces or pursue her dream, come what may. She chose the latter.”

As many such stories keep unfolding the question comes back to our minds every time we are faced with a seemingly difficult situation. Should it be a stumbling block or can we make it a stepping stone? As long as we can pause and gauge our strengths and weaknesses, when encountered with an obstacle in life, we will always be able to make any stumbling block into a stepping stone.