“Owning our story can be hard but not nearly as difficult as spending our lives running from it.”

Brené Brown

Today is all about resilience – how you can acquire it, how you can maintain it, and how you can leverage it to own your story and unleash that spirit you have within.

Our guest, Janine Shepherd, is one of my closest friends, and I can’t think of anyone better to guide us on resilience than her.

If you’ve read my book Think and Grow Rich: The Legacy, you’ll remember Janine’s story from Chapter 1. She is the greatest personification of resilience I’ve ever seen and I knew as soon as she shared her story with me that it would be the first thing people would read to inspire them as they ventured into the book.

Janine was a national champion skier and one of Australia’s best hopes for the Winter Olympics. But an accident while training destroyed her athletic dreams, and nearly ended her life. Paralyzed, Janine spent 10 days in a coma and then the following six months in the spinal ward.

She defied the odds by not only learning to walk again, but by creating an entirely new life in the most remarkable way.

Janine’s story has been featured all over television, including 60 Minutes and This is Your Life. Her first book, Never Tell Me Never, was made into a feature length film, and she has since written five other books including her recently-released memoir, Defiant.

Her TED talk has more than 2 million views and continues to be a featured favorite on TED.com.

Janine has been awarded Australia’s highest civilian honor, the Order of Australia, in recognition of her tireless work to raise awareness of spinal cord injury and research. She also serves as ambassador for Red Bull, Wings for Life, and Spinal Cure Australia, and is one of the world’s top inspirational speakers.

In this episode, we talk about:

• Finding the gift in adversity
• Coming to terms with your identity (and fitting in)
• Understanding shame – and the importance of owning your story, and
• Becoming a resilience machine so nothing can stand in your way.

Let’s WIN THE DAY with Janine Shepherd!

🎞️  For the video interview, click here.

Resources / links mentioned:

🗝️ Download your free Resilience Checklist.

⚡ Janine Shepherd’s website.

🎤 TED Talk: ‘A Broken Body Isn't A Broken Person’.

📝 Janine Shepherd’s Facebook.

📷 Janine Shepherd’s Instagram.

📚 ‘Defiant: A Broken Body Is Not A Broken Person’ by Janine Shepherd.

💡 ‘Man's Search for Meaning’ by Viktor E. Frankl.

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