[nabs-l] Personal characteristics and traits of successfulblind people

Sat Mar 29 16:02:48 UTC 2014

Absolutely nothing and, if you think that's what the federation teaches, you've been listening to the wrong people.

Sent from my iPhone

> On Mar 29, 2014, at 6:46 AM, Carly Mihalakis <carlymih at comcast.net> wrote:
> 
> Good morning, everyone,
> 
> So, going back to how Robin holds up interdependence as a means of getting assistance for such things as not quite accessable forms, what's wrong with that?
> for today, Car
> 
> At 02:23 PM 3/28/2014, Ashley Bramlett wrote:
>> Hi Joe,
>> very well said. I, too, cannot believe blindness is a nuisance anymore. Not with the barriers I face because the world is not conducive to nonvisual access, especially appliances and technology. Do I think about blindness a lot? No, its part of me; actually I have low vision.
>> I go about my business like making breakfast, listening to the news and weather via radio and watching tv shows that are rather auditory a lot and feel happy. I don't think about that I'm doing things differently because of my vision or feel down over it. But, it does play a role in my ability to accomplish visual tasks. For instance filling out job applications; its like half are inaccessible; I came across at least three which say errors, fix the boxes by red stars, and I do not know what the errors are. or others I fill out are not accepted telling me that I missed fields, and I have no idea which fields I missed. I need some eyes to assist me.
>> Then there is the transit issue; with mobility being a challenge, I struggle with that, and hate the inconvenience of paratransit.
>> Then you have electronics which we cannot see.  So,
>> no its not a nuisance, and we have not made enough progress to render blindness insignificant in doing what we want to do.
>> 
>> Anyway, I agree with you on success. Its about living your passions. Its also, I believe, about making goals, and doing them to change the world. Go out and achieve big things for you.
>> 
>> Also, yeah, success is you. Having a federal job as you do in that field, is a rather successful thing you accomplished.
>> You  are smart.
>> 
>> Ashley
>> -----Original Message----- From: Joe
>> Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2014 9:12 PM
>> To: 'National Association of Blind Students mailing list'
>> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Personal characteristics and traits of successfulblind people
>> 
>> Phil,
>> 
>> A successful blind person looks, acts, and communicates like me. Isn't that
>> obvious?
>> 
>> But, kidding aside, I want to give you a different perspective from the
>> people whining about how it is unfair to make blindness a factor in success.
>> Apparently some of us believe that success is success and blindness is
>> irrelevant, but to deny that blindness is a factor is to deny the reality
>> that more than 70% of our blind peers are unemployed. To a degree,
>> overcoming blindness is success onto itself, and if you can't succeed there,
>> a person's likelihood of succeeding anywhere else is slim. Is the person
>> willing to advocate for themselves? Are they willing to work twice as hard
>> to achieve tasks their sighted peers can complete sometimes in half the
>> time? Are they honest enough with themselves to tell if they possess
>> sufficient daily living, technology, and communication skills to succeed at
>> life, let alone the workplace? It may be true that our sighted peers may
>> need to ponder some of these points, but not with the same necessity or to
>> the same depth as the blind person who has to be extra competitive to beat
>> sighted applicants.
>> 
>> At some point over the past several years I stopped subscribing to the NFB
>> notion that blindness can be reduced to the level of a nuisance. Were that
>> true, I believe we would have seen better progress where blind people are
>> concerned. Blindness presents certain unique challenges a person must
>> regularly overcome to excel. Yes, building up confidence makes the process
>> easier, but I don't know that we have reached a point in our evolution of
>> independence that blindness is irrelevant, and certainly not so minimal as
>> to be labeled a minor inconvenience.
>> 
>> Now, as to success across the board, blind or sighted, I think pursuing your
>> own passions is a key ingredient. I wrote a blog post on the subject, which
>> you can read at the link below:
>> 
>> http://joeorozco.com/blog_are_you_living_someone_elses_dream
>> 
>> --
>> Twitter: @ScribblingJoe
>> 
>> Visit my blog:
>> http://joeorozco.com/blog
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: nabs-l [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Phil
>> Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2014 6:29 AM
>> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
>> Subject: [nabs-l] Personal characteristics and traits of successful blind
>> people
>> 
>> Hi all,
>> 
>> I'm working on a research paper, and would like to hear what you think.
>> Obviously there are external factors such as accessibility barriers, social
>> and attitudinal barriers and so on that affect a blind person's likelihood
>> of success in life.  But if we focus on personal characteristics for a
>> moment, what do you think are some personal characteristics that can help a
>> blind person succeed, or ask in a different way, what characteristics and
>> behavior traits do successful blind people around you exhibit? And what
>> makes you cite these traits?
>> For example, some have rightly pointed out that a sense of curiosity and
>> exploration is key, both curiosity to explore one's physical surrounding,
>> intellectual curiosity to explore different subjects and career
>> possibilities, and so on. Others have also pointed out having the courage to
>> be different is important as a blind person.
>> What else do you think are important characteristics or behavior traits?
>> Hope to hear lots of diverse views on this.
>> Thanks!
>> 
>> Best,
>> Phil
>> 
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