Written by Jill Fraser
A routine that would take the average person 30 minutes to complete takes him close to three hours. But he never complains.
Instead of cursing the gruelling daily grind Morris Goodman blesses every tentative step along the way because he knows that the very fact he is alive is an extraordinary miracle that defies the odds and continues to turn contemporary medicine on its head.
Since surviving a horrific light plane crash in 1981 that snapped his neck in two places, crushed his spine and his voice box, destroyed every major muscle in his body and threatened to take his life on more than one occasion as his body tried to shut down, Goodman has been known as The Miracle Man.
And surviving the accident was just the beginning of his physical and mental battle.
What followed were months of excruciating pain, humiliation and what appeared to be insurmountable obstacles. But remarkably, through amazing endurance and faith, Morris Goodman came through it and today he tours the world as one of the most highly regarded motivational speakers on the international circuit.
Initially unable to speak, eat, move or breathe without a respirator his mangled body was declared a vegetable. Then suddenly astonished family members noticed that he was blinking and winking in response to comments.
He underwent a marathon nine-hour operation that surgeons warned had a one in 1,000 survival rate and emerged only to discover that he would be totally paralysed for the rest of his life.
“At one point the doctor didn’t think I could hear and he was talking to my wife about the prognosis. He said, the most hope I can give you is that one day he might be able to sit up in a wheel chair and blink his eyes.
“Everyone, my family and friends and the nursing staff, were saying, why don’t you just give up and accept the way you are. If I’d given up no one would have blamed me because I’d suffered so much and apparently had nothing to live for,” he says.
But he kept going powered by his strength of will and the principles of positive thinking.
He maintains that he never doubted for a minute that he would get back on his feet and walk out the door of the hospital, and twelve months after his operation he did just that.
Prior to his accident Goodman had been the epitome of success. He was one of the leading life insurance salesmen in the world, a member of the exclusive Million Dollar Round Table and Top Of The Table Club, which is rather ironic considering tests showed that he had no aptitude for sales.
He credits his career achievements on Napoleon Hill’s book, Think and Grow Rich, which led him to believe that he could do whatever he told himself he could do, and his ability to beat the million-to-one odds of regaining his mobility and voice on the words of motivational speakers Norman Vincent Peale, Bob Proctor and Zig Ziglar.
“We all possess what it takes to get through situations like that but we don’t always use it. Everyone has the raw materials, what most people lack is the formula,” he says.
Goodman believes that the formula is linked to spirituality. For him it’s Christianity but he concedes that all paths to God ultimately converge. He maintains that by failing to acknowledge this deeper truth The Secret missed the point and omitted one of the most crucial ingredients of the Law of Attraction.
Goodman, whose life was saved by his adherence to the Law of Attraction, says; “until you really believe that you have a higher purpose than just existing and making money you won’t get it”.
Paradoxically, Goodman has big material dreams. His goal is to be making $1 million a week by the time he is 65. He’s now 61.
“The thing is that it’s not about making money for money’s sake because money alone won’t make you happy - although poverty won’t make you happy either!
“Money is wonderful but you also need what money won’t buy.
“Money will buy a house but it won’t buy a home. Money will buy companionship but it won’t buy love. Money will buy food but it won’t buy health.
“Life is about reaching your potential and becoming what God wants you to become.”
The challenge, he says, is remaining on the right path; the acid test being if things are “flowing”.
Goal setting, he says, is crucial but he has a problem with the way this is currently being taught.
Arguing that a lot of people are ‘emotionally sick’ and not ready to set goals, he says, goal setting is about thrusting forward whereas most people are running in the one place feeling guilty about what they did in the past and wondering about what’s going to happen tomorrow.
“Most people waste all their energy looking forward or back and don’t have any energy left to set goals.”
Goodman teaches emotional stability and argues strongly against the concept of self-esteem.
“Self-worth, self-esteem and selfimage”, he declares, “are the most negative concepts on the face of the earth”.
“The problem with self esteem and self worth is that it bases our worth on who we are or what we’ve achieved. When you base your worth on that you’re doomed to fail because you can never achieve enough, you can never have people love you enough and you can never be accepted enough.
“I teach unconditional acceptance. You’re worth something because God says you are. Not because of what you’ve achieved.
“When you equate your worth to that you’ll always be anxious because you can never hold onto it.”
Goodman is the Australia distributor of a new film, The Opus, which is about to be released on DVD and which he predicts, will rival the success of The Secret.
To contact Morris Goodman regarding workshops and corporate speaking check out www.themiracleman.org or www.goko.com.au
