The idea for writing Happily Disabled had been simmering in my mind for some time, but the ‘last straw’ occurred when, yet again (because I am disabled in a wheelchair), people kept assuming that I was unhappy and unable to mentally fend for myself. This is not how I feel, nor how I am, and this understanding needed to be corrected not only for myself but for all disabled people experiencing similar discrimination. Hence, Happy Disabled was written as a free e-book to show that in reality there is no difference between an able person and a disabled one. Okay, I can’t physically do some things but this does not make me any less of a person. I am a happy person and, in the book, I wanted to explain how and why I am happy even though I am classed as being severely disabled with multiple sclerosis.
I like my life as a disabled person. This life is not a matter of choice, it's a matter of how it is. Yes, I would like to trundle through woods or along the seashore or do all sorts of things I now cannot do but I have to accept what is possible and what is not, just the same as everybody has to do in their lives. If I evaluate either the good or the bad then I create trouble and disturbance for myself, which isn't happy.
Using the analogy of the sun, happiness to me is like sunshine. The sun is always shining somewhere 24-hours a day; it is only clouds which temporarily appear to block out its existence. So, when life creates clouds, which it always does, they can be transcended through the mind to the sunshine and happiness is regained because it’s known for certain that, like the sun, happiness can never completely disappear. This is the principle message of Happily Disabled.
MS had started by 1978. For the first 15 years, it was relapsing and remitting with various events and long gaps in between, which allowed me to carry on with my life without major change, apart from careers. After that, slowly and relatively evenly, MS progressed without remission until, among other things, I couldn't walk, had difficulties with my bladder and use of my arms and hands weakened. The progression continues but happiness doesn’t change.
Stuart Rose
Download free ebook at http://www.happilydisabled.com