Gifted Hands Quotes

“Success is determined not by whether or not you face obstacles, but by your reaction to them. And if you look at these obstacles as a containing fence, they become your excuse for failure. If you look at them as a hurdle, each one strengthens you for the next.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“Successful people don't have fewer problems. They have determined that nothing will stop them from going forward.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“To THINK BIG and to use our talents doesn't mean we won't have difficulties along the way. We will--we all do. If we choose to see the obstacles in our path as barriers, we stop trying. "We can't win," we moan. "They won't let us win.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“...I became acutely aware of an unusual ability--a divine gift, I believe--of extraordinary eye and hand coordination. It’s my belief that God gives us all gifts, special abilities that we have the privilege of developing to help us serve Him and humanity. And the gift of eye and hand coordination has been an invaluable asset in surgery. This gift goes beyond eye-hand coordination, encompassing the ability to understand physical relationships, to think in three dimensions. Good surgeons must understand the consequences of each action, for they’re often not able to see what’s happening to see on the other side of the area in which the area they’re actually working.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“I'm a good neurosugeon. That's not a boast but a way of acknowledging the innate ability God has given to me. Beginning with determination and using my gifted hands, I went on for training and sharpening for my skills. ”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“Do what you have to do so that you can be what you want to be”
― Benjamin Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“I came to realize that if people could make me angry they could could control me. Why should I give someone else such power over my life?”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“No knowledge is ever wasted.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“It's not what you do but that kind of job you do that makes the difference.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“By reading so much, my vocabulary automatically improved along with my comprehension.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“if you can read, honey, you can learn just about anything you want to know. The doors of the world are open to people who can read. And”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“One reason I didn’t hold any grudges or harsh feelings toward Dad must have been that my mother seldom blamed him—at least not to us or in our hearing. I can hardly think of a time when she spoke against him.”
― Ben Carson M.D., Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“being a member of a minority race doesn’t mean being a minority achiever.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“No one ever said, “This isn’t the way normal people live.” Again, I think it was the sense of family unity, strengthened by the Averys, that kept me from being too concerned about the quality of our life in Boston.”
― Ben Carson M.D., Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“The culture in which we live stresses looking out for number one. Without adopting such a self-centered value system, we can demand the best of ourselves while we are extending our hands to help others.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“He who is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city” (RSV).”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“close the wounds, and the 22-hour surgical ordeal was over. The Siamese”
― Ben Carson M.D., Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“No knowledge is ever wasted. To quote the apostle Paul: “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God” (Romans 8:28).”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“Abraham Lincoln once said, “All that I am or ever hope to be, I owe to my mother.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“when the Vietnamese came to the United States they often faced prejudice from everyone—White, Black, and Hispanics. But they didn’t beg for handouts and often took the lowest jobs offered. Even well-educated individuals didn’t mind sweeping floors if it was a paying job. Today many of these same Vietnamese are property owners and entrepreneurs. That’s the message I try to get across to the young people. The same opportunities are there, but we can’t start out as vice president of the company. Even if we landed such a position, it wouldn’t do us any good anyway because we wouldn’t know how to do our work. It’s better to start where we can fit in and then work our way up.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“I looked up through a scatter of fluttering leaves silhouetted against the rosy autumn sunset.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“I can tolerate amazing amounts of stress and ridicule. By God’s grace, it still doesn’t require any effort to shake off unpleasant, irritating things. God has helped me to conquer my terrible temper, once and forever. During those hours in the bathroom I also came to realize that if people could make me angry they could control me. Why should I give someone else such power over my life? Over the years I’ve chuckled at people who deliberately did things they thought would make me angry. I’m no better than anyone else, but I laugh inside at how foolish people can be, trying to make me angry.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“70,000 to 100,000 births; twins joined at the head occur only once in 2 to 2.5 million births. Siamese twins received their name because of the birthplace (Siam) of Chang and Eng (1811 - 1874) whom P.T. Barnum exhibited across America and Europe. Most cranio pagus Siamese twins die at birth or shortly afterward. So far as we know, not more than 50 attempts had previously been made to separate such twins. Of those, less than ten operations have resulted in two fully normal children. Aside from the skill of the operating surgeons, the success depends largely on how much and what kind of tissue the babies share. Occipital cranio pugus twins (such as the Binders) had never before been separated with both surviving.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“creativity is just learning to do something with a different perspective.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“Successful people don’t have fewer problems. They have determined that nothing will stop them from going forward.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“Always put first things first.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“There isn’t anybody in the world who isn’t worth something,” I say. “If you’re nice to them, they’ll be nice to you. The same people you meet on the way up are the same kind of people you meet on the way down. Besides that, every person you meet is one of God’s children.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“God has an overall plan for people’s lives and the details get worked out along the way, even though we usually have no idea what’s going on.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“The bottom line was that we have only ourselves to blame. We create our own destiny by the way we do things. We have to take advantage of opportunities”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“I recognized others’ abilities as well. But in any career, whether it’s that of a TV repairman, a musician, a secretary—or a surgeon—an individual must believe in himself and in his abilities. To do his best, one needs a confidence that says, “I can do anything, and if I can’t do it, I know how to get help.”
― Ben Carson, Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story