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Burley man educates students on overcoming life's hardships

Posted at 6:13 PM, Apr 29, 2021
and last updated 2021-04-29 22:46:57-04

MALTA, ID — Terry Lamb of Burley faced many hurdles throughout his life. Now he uses his experiences to educate kids across Idaho on the importance of not letting life kick you down, and if you fail, try again.

“I wasted 10 years of my life, making excuses, taking shortcuts, not challenging everything," said Lamb. "Once I started challenging everything, my life became much simpler, and I became much more successful.”

At the age of 18, Lamb was in a life-threatening car accident where he shattered his eye socket, jawbones, suffered broken vertebrae, broken ribs, and fractures in most of the bones throughout his body. He was told he would never walk again.

After many years of rehabilitation, he now owns his own gym and participates in American Ninja Warrior competitions across the United States.

Lamb said those challenges made him who is he today.

“I come out here, and I try to show them that the unknown is good for you. You’re going to grow, accept it, embrace it, chase it, challenge it. So when something hard comes your way, face it head-on,” said Lamb.

However, Lamb doesn't just lecture the kids, he makes them get on their feet and run through an obstacle course that he constructed. He encourages the kids to fall, get up and try again.

“When we come out here push them through an obstacle course, nothing that happens out here is going to be a sliver of what’s going to knock them down in life," Lamb said. "We’re just going to show them it’s OK to fail but it’s not OK to quit.”

Lamb was at Raft River High School in Malta Thursday, and although it wasn't the typical assembly for these students, the message he sent resonated with them.

“I saw that they would fall, and they would be like, "Oh I can't do this,” but he would be like, "You got this, try one more time, and if not I’m here to help you." I thought that was really cool that there is always help if we need it. You just have to ask sometime,” said Mckelle Larson, a senior at Raft River High School.

“We need talking to about how to overcome and not to give up, and just overcome our fears and if life gets hard, just keep on moving,” senior Ethan Bernad said.

Even teachers could see the importance and the impact that Terry's lesson was having on the students and themselves.

“I think it's great because they do sit in classes, we talk to them as teachers, they get lectured over and over again," said Branden Severe, a science teacher at Raft River.

"They don't often get the time to come out and actually experience what is being talked about. He talked about failure and getting back up and we get to experience it first hand. I’ve done the course three different times and I failed every time, but I did it again and again.”

After the lecture and obstacle course was done, Lamb wanted at least one thing taken away from everything he and the kids discussed.

“No matter who, no matter what you’ve been through, you can accomplish anything that life throws at you," Lamb said. "Work hard and how bad do you want it? Ge out there and do something uncomfortable today.”