A short motivational YouTube narration by Vishen Lakhiani recounting Lionel Messi's childhood struggle with a growth hormone deficiency, his daily medical treatment (injections), and how he adapted his play to become one of soccer's greatest players (nicknamed 'La Pulga'). The piece uses Messi's story to argue that dreams and attitude can overcome obstacles; it highlights perseverance (practicing since age two or three) and cites his recognition as a seven-time world best player.
Questions this video answers
A growth hormone deficiency.
Sticking needles into his legs every single day (daily injections).
La Pulga (The Flea).
Ever since he was two or three years old.
Seven times.
Chapters
A dream has the capacity to change your life. Every invention, every creation, every important thing that ever happened in this world started with a dream. A dream expands you. A dream shows you not only who you are, but who you can become. A dream will allow you to grow in the process of achieving it, doesn't it? And a dream will help you push through obstacles that seem impossible to push through. So this is the story of a little boy with a big dream. And this little boy dreamed about playing football. It was his long life dream. He wanted to play football. And so he did. Ever since he was two or three years old. He would be with a ball all day long. And one day his parents said, this boy is really good. Let's go and take him for a tryout. So they take him to one of the big clubs in his country for a tryout. And the guys who are looking at him say, yeah, the boy is good, but what's wrong with him? He's too small. Look at him. He is definitely too small. Something is not right with this kid. So they take him to the doctors, and the doctors check him out and they say, yeah, there's something wrong with this kid. And it's not a minor thing. In fact, it's quite a rare disease. But it's a big thing. And the big thing is that this kid was born with a growth hormone deficiency, which in essence means that his body refuses to grow. And so these guys who were about to sign the contract with him said, no, we're not going to do this, because this kid was born broken. He was born broken. Have you ever felt broken before? Yeah. And some brave guys are putting up their hands. Have you ever felt like I'm not good enough? I'm not attractive enough, I'm not talented enough, I'm not intelligent enough? I don't have enough friends? I don't have enough money? There's something wrong with me. Well, this kid, he was born broken. And these people were not there to fix him. But you know what this kid did? The kid with the broken pencil, he said, I'm going to keep doing this. I'm going to keep focusing on my dream. Because I will make my dream bigger than my obstacle. And I will do whatever I have to do to make my dream come true. And if that means setting my mind and reminding myself every single day, why am I here? What do I want to achieve? I will do that. And if that means doing really difficult things like sticking needles into my legs every single day just to see if my body will start growing I will do that. And then he said, you know what? I will set my mind to believe that this obstacle football can actually be my opportunity. This can be my opportunity. I will learn how to play football in a different way. Yes. I'm not as big as the other ones. I'm not as tall as the other ones. I will have to learn to play in a different way. And so he did. And what he did, he basically got a sharpener and he sharpened his pencil. So when you get a broken pencil, what do you do? You sharpen it. And how do you sharpen a pencil? You sharpen a pencil by thinking, what can I do with what I have? What can I do with this obstacle? What can I do with what I've been given? And so he did, and he kept believing in himself and he kept focusing on his dream. And this kid who was nicknamed the Flea in Spanish, La Pulga because of how tiny he was, he became the biggest player of all times. This is the true story of Lionel Messi. Lionel Messi, the guy who has created history in soccer. As an Argentinian, I'm so proud to call this guy a fellow. Well, we share our country. The guy who has been named seven times best player in the world, he has been seven times best player in the world in three different decades, which says a lot about him, because he's been doing this for quite a long time, right? This guy was a broken kid. He was born with a problem. Everyone said, you're not going to make it. Forget about us. But what did he do? Focus on the dream and made the obstacle smaller. And so the message of this story is, your problems do not define you. We all have problems. They do not define you. What defines you? Your attitude. Your attitude defines you. And attitude is not a small thing. Attitude is a big thing. Let me tell you. It's a huge thing. When you change your attitude, you change your results. When you change the way you're facing something, you change absolutely everything about it. So choose your attitude. Every time you can decide that.
