Who inspires you? Is it someone who has accomplished something that you dream of doing? Or is it someone who has overcome significant obstacles to succeed despite their challenges? Maybe it could be someone who has done both, becoming a famous person with disability and their achievements which is something greater than one could ever imagine, like those who’re successful people with disabilities and have achieved great success in many goals while living their lives to the fullest with their disabilities.
For today’s dose of knowledge from The Daily Top 10, the World’s #1 Source of Research-Based Content, we thought of a list of the Top 10 most famous people living with disabilities worldwide who have succeeded in life.
How Do Those People With Disabilities Inspire You?
Disability is the most common talkable topic in the world. It significantly and highly affects the life of a person with a disability. The life of a person with a disability is not very easy. This is why we consider them inspiring role models for everyone. They didn’t view their disabilities as a limitation but as a tool to take them where they wanted to go.
Read on to learn about the top 10 people who refused to be limited by their disabilities and how these inspiring achievers pursued their dreams and passions to have made a difference in the lives of many.
TOP 10: Aaron Fotheringham
Aaron Fotheringham is one of the most outstanding skaters in the world. Sunrise Medical identifies Aaron Fotheringham as an excellent example for thousands of people, and we listed Aaron in the 10th place of our Top 10 world-famous people living with disabilities. Aaron Fotheringham is one of the famous athletes from Las Vegas, Nevada, from the famous people living with disabilities; he was born with a birth defect of the spinal cord, which led to him having no use of his legs. Aaron was forced to use the wheelchair permanently as he went through several failed hip operations in his childhood.
Nevertheless, he broke the significant obstacle by practicing his favorite sport, and his passion for skating pushed him up to become a celebrity with a disability. All his effort was to change the mindset of people towards persons with disabilities, and finally, he achieved all his dreams while adapting to his disability.
TOP 9: Michael J. Fox
The world-famous Michael J. Fox is a Canadian actor and author who has 9th place among famous people living with disabilities and an advocate whose Hollywood career has been remarkable, and who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 1991 at the age of 29.
Even though Fox went through hard times with his Parkinson’s disease, he later became the founder of the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s research. Besides, the New York Times called Michael J. Fox Foundation ” the most credible voice on Parkinson’s research in the world.” In addition to that, Michaeljfox explains how even after 20 years of suffering from the disease in a very advanced stage, Michael J. Fox stepped again into his acting career and then became a bestselling author.
TOP 8: Andrea Bocelli
The world’s most famous living tenor and best-selling classical crossover artist, Andrea Bocelli, is one of the finest artists of our generation. According to Classic FM, he has been portrayed as one of the famous people living with disabilities in Italy. He is a tenor, multi-instrumentalist, and writer who was born with congenital glaucoma, which made him partially blind at birth. At the age of 12, an accident during a football game made him completely blind.
Even Bocelli studied in the field of Law; he was extremely graced by the spirit of singing by birth. Therefore, he thought to focus entirely on music to improve his innate ability. Specifically, he was passionate about singing. As a result, 75 million records were sold by Bocelli, and international prestige awarded numerous awards to him.
TOP 7: Marlee Matlin
Marlee Matlin is the academy award winner in today’s Top 10 list. As reported in IMDb, she is an American actress and activist who won the academy award for best acting performance for her debut film ‘Children of a Lesser God’ (1986) as the first deaf performer in the world. Matlin also deserved the Golden Globe award for this movie.
Marlee Matlin is one of the female celebrities with disabilities who lost her sense of hearing at the age of 18 months because of a genetically malformed cochlea. Her education career also stopped halfway due to her deafness, but she didn’t limit her ability to deafness; rather, she started her career as an actress. As a result, she appeared in several TV shows such as; L Word and Law & Order: SVU, The Apprentice, and Dancing with the Stars. Accordingly, she became a great inspiration and example for the hearing impaired.
TOP 6: Sean Stephenson
Sean Stephenson is also one of the famous motivational speakers in our today’s Top 10 list of the world’s inspiring famous people living with disabilities. Stephenson was affected by the rare bone disorder called Osteogenesis Imperfecta at birth and anticipated less viability of life. Consequently, that decelerates his growth and causes soft bones that may break easily.
Despite his disability, Sean took courage for a better life, inspiring millions of people worldwide. As a result, his power of speaking has gone live in nearly 48 states and 16 countries. Also, he shared the stage with dozens of celebrities during his 25 years of speaking career and inspired many people during his living years.
TOP 5: Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo is one of the iconic Mexican artists of the twentieth century. She was affected by polio at the age of 6 and met with an accident during her teenage which led her to be physically ill for her entire life.
She is exceptionally well known for her self-portraits, and the major theme of her art became ideas of identity, post-colonialism, gender, class, and race of Mexican society, which were influenced by her personal life. According to Sunrisemedical, Frida suffered a lot, but still, she became one of the inspirational characters all the time; for that reason, we picked Frida Kahlo as number 5 on our list of the Top 10 world’s inspiring famous people living with disabilities.
If you need to know more about Frida Kahlo’s art, read more on the Top 10 greatest and most famous Mexican paintings of all time on our The Daily Top 10.
TOP 4: John Hockenberry
John Hockenberry is a world-famous person with a disability, from the list of the world’s most inspiring famous people living with disabilities, who achieved his dreams of life as a journalist and author. But unfortunately, this American had to be in a wheelchair throughout his life due to his spinal cord injury.
According to PLAY, Hockenberry never thought of his disability as an insurmountable obstacle. As a result, he ended up winning the Emmy Award four times and Peabody Award three times. In addition, he wrote some famous books such as; War Zones, Wheelchairs, and Declarations of Independence.
TOP 3: Franklin Roosevelt
In 1921, Franklin Roosevelt was a rising star in the Democratic party when polio struck him and left him with paralyzed legs. Determined that he would walk again so that he could resume his political career, he set himself a stiff regime of exercise.
History shows that he never did achieve his goal of walking. But, urged by his wife and a close associate, he re-entered public life. At a time when people with disabilities were often sent to asylums, Roosevelt and his insistence on “good cheer” won the hearts of the voters, who elected him president not once but four times. Roosevelt led the country through the Great Depression and World War II and never ceased to advocate for those who were disabled.
TOP 2: Stephen Hawking
Stephen Hawking is the second most famous leading role in Today’s Top 10 inspiring famous people living with disabilities. Hawking is a highly talented person because he is an achiever of theoretical physicists, astrophysicists, cosmologists, and eminent scientists. At the age of 21, Hawking was diagnosed with ALS within only 2 years of his lifetime, but fortunately, he died in his seventies.
Even though his body was fully paralyzed, he conducted his elementary research, which made him and his illness famous worldwide. Even Hawking’s story was adapted to the cinema, which shows how much he has been successful in his life, making us provide Hawking a space in our Top 10 list.
TOP 1: Nick Vujicic
Nick Vujicic is the most successful person who was born without limbs. A life without limbs is much harder than sitting in a wheelchair; that is why we ranked Nick Vujicic as Top number 1 in today’s Top 10 list of the world’s most inspiring famous people living with disabilities.
Nick Vujicic is a world-famous speaker, author, and entrepreneur. He endlessly suffered during his childhood from discrimination and ridicule that made him try to commit suicide. Fortunately, with time he started to realize the value of life and learn to convert obstacles into opportunities. Successful Nick became the founder of Life Without Limbs – an organization for people with physical disabilities, as mentioned in NickVujicic. Besides his motivational talks, he wrote some books and presented them in TV shows.
Who Among the Persons with Disability Inspired You Most?
We have listed the Top 10 world-most inspiring famous people living with disabilities. How hard life is, their disability couldn’t prevent them from being successful. Not only they made a difference in their life but made a better life for others also.
To inspire you, we will provide the list of names again. So go further; if they can achieve, you can achieve even more!
- Nick Vujicic
- Stephen Hawking
- Franklin Roosevelt
- John Hockenberry
- Frida Kahlo
- Sean Stephenson
- Marlee Matlin
- Andrea Bocelli
- Michael J. Fox
- Aaron Fotheringham
While inspired by those great personalities, don’t miss the Top 10 Most Inspiring German Women who inspired the world as The Daily Top 10 Team always brings you something to impress, though.
Author: Jera A.
Jera A. is an empowered woman, a dedicated student leader, and an academic commissioner. She recently focused on exploring more of her skills while also learning new things to help herself blossom. She believes that anyone, from anywhere, can make a difference.
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