“If we all understood that everyone is different for a reason, and accept and respect each other the way we are, surely, this world would be so much better for it”
Morung Express Feature
Dimapur | February 26
More and more stories about people with physical setbacks accomplishing feats are bringing a change to reflect reality for able-bodied people.
People considered as “limited” are now proving those around them that they always had the will to accomplish what others thought impossible.
Born with the physical condition of “congenital deformity of bones,” life was always a full-sized challenge for Anungla Longchari, especially for her mother who had to nurse her fragile body with extra care and concern. “My parents were very careful even while traveling in the car. They would hold me up so that my back would not get hurt or break,” she recollects.
She was considered limited due to the birth defect and never got an opportunity to attend school. However, little did anyone comprehend that one day this fragile girl would start writing and even work in a newspaper office.
“I just learned to read and write at home by going through my sibling’s books. I was born very fragile. Doctors told my parents that I wouldn’t survive for long,” Anung says.
Gradually as she grew up, Anung began to realize that “life was not as normal as others’.” Anung says that whenever she went out, she always felt “sympathy and feelings of pity” and as an object “to be scrutinized or studied.”
“At one point of time, I was very angry and depressed. I started questioning God, why I was brought into this world to just exist and not live,” she says.
While still living in despair, life unfolded a turning point in her life. There was a big healing crusade in Dimapur. Anung’s mother, being a “very strong woman of faith” believed that if her daughter attended that service, she would get healed. Anung agreed to attend the crusade and miraculously, she received healing.
“That was the moment I began to feel a sensation throughout my legs. I stood up and I could take one or two steps by myself. After returning home, people started coming to my place… they wanted to witness the miracle that they had heard of and they would ask me to stand up and walk to see that healing had really taken place in me. They couldn’t believe and so they wanted to see for themselves the healing,” she remembers with delight.
“I gradually realized God’s purpose for me. After the healing, I began to have a more positive outlook on life,” she adds.
The “miracle story” soon caught the attention of the media and Nagaland Page covered her story in an interview. That was the beginning of a new journey for both sides.
“I was starting to write at that time. A few of my poems got published in the paper (Nagaland Page). They saw me not as a limitation, but an opportunity and offered me a job,” she states with utmost appreciation for the newspaper where she worked for more than twelve years as a graphic designer.
The whole experience gave her the chance to strive for more and accomplish what many only dream of. She says that Nagaland Page was “the first step into the outside world, an eye-opening experience in many ways.”
Currently, she is fully involved in the Sinai Ministry and The Lighthouse Church, Dimapur, taking care of the weekly newsletter and media-related activities of the organisations.
The inspiring soul, who in her leisure time enjoys writing, reading, music, movies, knitting and crocheting, says that she does not have anyone as a role model; “Not that I have high standards, but because I don’t want to have to try to live up to someone’s standards or ideals, and fail or lose myself and who I am meant to be, in the quest.”
She asserts, “Nobody is perfect, but I strongly believe that there is an inherent goodness in every single being and that goodness comes through in different ways and measures, breadths, lengths, and in various shades and forms. That is what makes it so intriguing and inspirational about everyone; that yes, that’s what it takes to keep her/his story going… because in the end, we are all stories but with different plots, parts and endings.”
Sharing her outlook on being a person with physical challenges and born different from what society term as ‘normal’, Anung says, “I have had people cluck their tongues in sympathy and say out loud (right in front of me, as if I wasn’t around) how very “unlucky” I was to be born the way I am. It took me a long time to realize that physical limitations do not make one a handicap. The real handicap or the lack of it lies in the mind. A person who cannot think or love beyond the four walls of their home, and who limit their understanding of the world within their periphery, and can never quite comprehend the beauty and magnitude of God’s blueprint for His creations, is, to me, suffering from the worst kind of handicap.”
“If we all understood that everyone is different for a reason, and accept and respect each other the way we are, surely, this world would be so much better for it,” she stated with much hope and trust.
