Falklands War veteran Simon Weston CBE bought the audience close to tears with a powerful motivational speech at SHExpo 2017.
Weston, who survived the bombing of RFA Sir Galahad in 1982, said ‘you either have belief in yourself or you don’t’ and described his journey of recovery from his life-threatening injuries.
He said: ‘I discovered more kinds of degrees of pain than I could imagine. But worse than that I lost my identity, I began to lose sight of myself.
‘I was like a helpless child – I was just 20 years of age and I didn’t want to be the person on the street that people looked away from in disbelief.’
Weston described how a trip organised by his regiment, the Welsh Guards, to watch its rugby team play in Germany.
He said a handshake with one of his army colleagues made him realise that he needed to instill positivity and self-reliance.
‘They had been killing me with kindness at home. He said, “shake my hand properly boy” but what I realised he was really saying was “you’re becoming disabled even in your handshake”.’
Thank you @Simon_Weston for a moving & courageous speech today at @SHExpo. Your determination, influence & wit is #inspirational to us all pic.twitter.com/ErSzWpLvPM
— HSE International (@HSE_INT) June 22, 2017
He then talked through how he ‘rebuilt the new Simon Weston’ over a four-year period.
‘We have more control than we think we have. We have to accept the challenge of change. Sometimes you forget yourself. It’s all about self-belief.’
Weston set up a charity, The Weston Spirit, which gave him a role in society and there ‘was nothing like helping young people.’
He also said that meeting the Argentinian fighter pilot who bombed the RFA Sir Galahad helped him ‘invest in my future, by getting rid of my nightmares.’
He also said that there was ‘nothing you can do’ about negative and nasty people but that ‘you must always maintain your dignity’ in the face of adversity.
‘You must be positive about everything that you do. Whatever it is you have to face, I hope you face it. It is about what you are prepared to do with your life.’
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Sounds amazing and sorry to have missed it
Attended the Event and watched Simon give his Motivational speech, what an inspiration to others. the applause at the end was over whelming.
I was touched by Simon’s experiences and took back the message that “whatever life throws at us we all have the ability to adapt and reinvent ourselves somewhat whether through injury, circumstance or through our own hand. If you are given a second chance embrace it.