He Lost His Leg. Then He Gained His Purpose. – James Dixon

 

Airdate: April 23, 2025

Julie Rose: Hey friends, just really quickly before we get started today, I want to give you a heads up that in my conversation you're about to hear with James Dixon, he's going to share a story that involves attempted suicide and also some pretty serious medical consequences. It ends in a really hopeful way, but I didn't want it to catch you off guard. And if you're not in a place right now to be able to listen to that, please take care of yourself.

James Dixon: I played against everyone who said I couldn't achieve.

I played against everyone who said I wouldn't be able to walk. I played against the doctors that said I wouldn't live. I played against every kid that ever made fun of me.

Julie Rose: Hey, it's Julie. Welcome to Uncomfy, a show about sticking with moments that challenge us even when they're uncomfortable. And you're probably wondering, "Why would anyone choose to be uncomfortable?" But I know from personal experience, and you probably do too, that sometimes a little discomfort has benefits if we can manage to stay open and curious about it. And what we're here to explore, so let's get Uncomfy.  

Julie Rose: I'm joined by James Dixon. He's a motivational speaker and author of Absolute Motivation: Battle Tested Principles for Next-Level Living. Absolute Motivation is also the name of his company. James, welcome. It's great to have you.

James Dixon: I'm honored to be here, and I'm glad to be Uncomfy.

Julie Rose: Well, listen, my mom had a nickname for me as a kid, "Bug" was what she called me, Julie Bug, and I kind of hated it, honestly, so I didn't ever want anyone to use it, but your grandmother called you a nickname that is much cooler, and it's really stuck around. Would you tell us about that?

James Dixon: Well, I'll be glad to. Whenever I talk about, um, my grandmother, it's always emotional, even though she's been gone 25 years, it's been 10 minutes in my heart. She called me "Superman" because she didn't want me to accept the title people had given me for being disabled. I was called "cripple," and she said, "You're not crippled. You have kryptonite, and if you can overcome that, you can become something." So, it was always her intention, from the time I was a small child, all of my childhood photos, I have a Superman buckle on, a t-shirt on, something to always indicate and remind me I am more than I've ever imagined. I just have to imagine myself being Superman.

Julie Rose: And your kryptonite in, in that, um, in, in her mind and in yours then was this, was your leg?

James Dixon: Right, but it was more than my leg. I wasn't supposed to live, uh, for long. I had poor blood circulation. I had a ton of things wrong. My first surgery, I was 30 days, six, I was 90 days old, and then I had a surgery every six months until I was 11. And so, it was my leg that was dying on me first, but overall I was having all those issues, and I didn't take my first steps until I was 11.

Julie Rose: And tell us how you ended up, um, you had your leg amputated then at around the age of 11, and yet you somehow managed to play college basketball on a scholarship.

James Dixon: I wanted to compete against the best, and the only way I could do that is to be Uncomfy enough to go after kids who were designated as "able-bodied." So, I decided I would pick basketball because in living in Indiana, it was the king of all sports. The kids that were participating in that get all the attention, so I decided, even from my wheelchair, I wanted to play basketball. And I decided every morning I'd get up, 4 AM, I ran a mile with a 25-pound prosthetic wooden leg at the time. Didn't matter. I was getting in shape. I was going to do it, and the determination paid off. I was able to, uh, average, 15 points, uh, 17 rebounds, and as a, uh, as a, before going off to college and high school, which got my attention from recruiters and I got a, two full ride scholarship offers, and I settled on the one going to Minnesota because they were going to start me as a freshman.

Julie Rose: I've heard you tell, um, an earlier part of that story when you went out for your high school basketball team because obviously that would, you know, that was the first step, right?

James Dixon: The coach wouldn't give me the opportunity. I'd try out and he would say, "If it wasn't for your leg," then he would tell me, "If it wasn't for you being a junior, I would have kept you," you know? And so, I tried out for AAU teams and played in rec leagues, but I was able to play against some of the best players during the AAU time, and Sean Bradley, Utah's very own, to be able to play against a 7'6" kid and be able to use the fact that I was already 240, so use my strength against a 180 pound guy to be able to get attention and show that, whatever you want to achieve, you've got to get so uncomfortable with your average self that you find your best self. And so, for me, I knew that I had to overcome the disability or the limitations of a prosthetic, but I did so by playing so determined, and when I say "determined," I mean "angry." I played against everyone who said I couldn't achieve.

I played against everyone who said I wouldn't be able to walk. I played against the doctors that said I wouldn't live. I played against every kid that ever made fun of me, so that my intensity level made up for what I lacked in bone density.

Julie Rose: So, James, when you were playing, uh, with these rec leagues and these club teams, right, because the high school wouldn't put you on the team, um, were you, I mean, how, how were you able to compete with, with guys who two able-bodied legs, right? I mean, did you have to, how did you have to adapt your play?

James Dixon: I played with a complete commitment to anger, that every one of them was an enemy, and so they were the ones holding me back from my dreams, every kid that grabbed the rebound. I was, uh, I was probably the type that have intensity that you thought I was going to fight at any second with anyone at any time, but I had something to fight for.

You can't go throughout life without passion. If you have a limitation, you have to do something to overcome it and playing with an outright abandon, with purpose, with commitment, it makes other people back down who don't want it as much. And so, I played with the idea that if my grandmother cared enough to come watch me play, I played every play as if it were going to be my last. I would look over to the stands at her, and I promised her I was going to give my all. I dove on the floor. I ran over kids. If I had to foul you hard, whatever it took to let you know that I was here, I made that statement.

And then, there's, there's something about those of us who, who come to take sides, and then there's something about those of us who come to take over, and a lot of people are uncomfortable with the idea that you come for the takeover, but if you could ever get to that point, you'll find that it's very rare that people ever want to give that level of commitment.

Julie Rose: Um, I guess I do, you mentioned, I'm glad you brought up that people are maybe a little uncomfortable because I'm thinking, "Oh my goodness," if, if, if I had a kid who was doing that, who was playing like that, who was just brimming with anger at every moment and intensity, I would also hope that off the court, he could, he could kind of put that aside, maybe. I mean, was that challenging for you? Like, how have you balanced, you know, the intensity to achieve, but also to not just be, like, getting into fights all the time, and being a nightmare to your grandma, and kind of all of the stuff that goes on in personal life?

James Dixon: So, I love how you, you said that. There was never a time that I was ever a nightmare to her. There was never a time I miss curfew. There was never a time where I had to be put on punishment. Because it was about everything I did, I did with the same level of intensity. I just channeled that anger. There is nothing wrong with every emotion that God has given us.

It is what you do with it. So, if it can become fuel, then let it burn. Because there's a reserve tank for all the other things. So, it's about channeling it. It's funny that you got uncomfortable with the idea that if you had a kid who was angry, but what if the, if the anger becomes power? It's a, it's still an emotion God gave us. It doesn't show up in a destructive way on the court, but it becomes fuel. And the idea of taking over and dominating isn't a negative thing.

It's the only thing that should happen when you've been given the setbacks. I could claim like my father said, "It's a white man's world. Black men have no place in it," or I could believe that, in spite of my race, the grace of God was enough that exactly as I am, disabled and all, I was able if I could take the "dis-" off of it, but that's about being uncomfortable.

Julie Rose: Were you always, uh, willing to be open about, about your leg? Um, like, in every instance, sort of like, kind of out there and open about, "This is who I am, and I'm here to dominate."

James Dixon: No, it was unnecessary because I didn't want to be defined by it. There are so many people who will limit you. The idea that, "You can't be, won't be," it happened all, my whole life. My father said, "There's no way you could be a kid of mine being a cripple. I can't make cripples," and so he denied my existence.

My mom said that, "You have to accept the fact that you are a cripple. There are things you will never accomplish in life," and so I had to turn that into fuel. It took a while for me to get to the point where I'm, like, I'm willing to even acknowledge it, because I believed, rather than me accept it, I just wanted to show that I was more than just the loss of my limb, that the loss of a limb doesn't mean I lost my purpose or my way, just I had to find a different way to do it, if it meant playing with intensity, if it meant playing with purpose, if it meant living with purpose. And so, I got to the point where I decided I would become Uncomfy and open up and admit that, "Yes, I do have a limitation, but with that, I created new boundaries."

And so, when I began to speak, I've had 7, 300 soldiers I've talked to about losing their leg because I learned to mask and operate as an able-bodied person would, and I've brought those techniques into the adaptive world, and I've changed the world of others with it. That's what put me on the national market.

Julie Rose: Tell me a little more about how that, how that happened. When was the moment where you realized, "Oh, like, other people could resonate with my story in a way that I could help?"

James Dixon: Well, I think it was happening with my faith, even as a child, um, because my grandmother couldn't read and write being that she was, her, her parents were born slaves and she was born free. And she faced the type of persecution and disrespect that I never had to face, and so she poured everything into making sure that I had all the advantages, and so I became her reader. I became the, her spokesperson. So, when, if you're thinking about the idea of becoming uncomfortable and then becoming something for other people, it began there. It just migrated over to a niche market of amputees. Today, I'm more than just a spokesman for amputees or an advocate.

I speak for, on behalf of a whole different audience. Everyone experiences loss, whether it be loss of relationship, loss of loved ones, loss of jobs, loss of health, it's just translating the loss from being a loss of a limb and what happened to me to switch it over to what happens to all of us, and loss can be a gain. I just didn't know that the loss of my leg as a kid was actually the gain of my future in the building of my name as an adult.

Julie Rose: Is there an encounter you've had recently with someone in the audience or a group that you've been working with, um, that is just really gratifying for you, that you could share with us?

James Dixon: I'll share one with you that comes to mind in two ways. There was a young man named Pat. Pat had gone through a traumatic experience in his personal life, loss of his job, marriage, and so he decided to shoot himself, and just so happened he went outside, it was so cold it kept him alive. Pat was taken to the hospital, and when they got there, frostbite had done a damage on him. It kept him alive, kept him from dying, but it also destroyed his hands and his legs. I get a phone call and they said, "Hey, can you come speak to me, to Pat because he's got traumatic experience now, and he's got these thing called phantoms?" At the loss of the limb, you still feel the limb, even though it's gone. The foot that's not there will be cramping, pain, uh, an itchy ankle, any of those things, even though you don't have it, and there's nothing you can do about it. And so, I went and visited him, spent some time with him, built his confidence up. They brought him to a church service where I was speaking, and there I told him that, "In a month's time, we'll have you up and walking." He didn't have the money for the prosthetics. They're a hundred thousand dollars a piece when you're above the knee amputee. I got that donated right there on the spot. We bought the prosthetics, and six weeks later, Pat was able to walk into the same church.

I came back just for that special ceremony, stand on that same platform with a second opportunity in life. Challenged, changed, transformed, but if you were to ask me, that is a more impactful moment because the bullet that went through him could have killed him, but what it did was it found a way to lodge into his purpose and give him a second lease on life. To be able to speak to him in front of his congregation, in front of his family, and to see him reclaim that life is more than what you go through, the loss of a job, the loss of a moment, that he became a spokesman, a speaker, talking to kids about the dangers of suicide and depression. It's given him a second lease. So, if you ask me, the ripple of speaking becomes a wave of other people becoming an echo of their own message, and now he travels and speaks on stages that are separate than mine, but because God put him in my heart and reminded him that he could be more than what he had.

Julie Rose: Faith is an important part of your story then, it sounds like.

James Dixon: Without it, my grandmother wouldn't have had anything to pour into me. I had to believe that somehow all those lessons and all those things from the only woman to tell me, "I love you." When she died, I had no one. She was the only one reared me. The brother that I had, half brother from my father, had been murdered. I'm in the inner city, and there are kids who want to kill me because they think I'm going to get revenge for them killing my brother. It's expected. It's the reason why I had to leave one day after graduating high school, because I wouldn't have lived if I stayed in that same city. And so, I live with a different level of intensity because life came at me differently.

Julie Rose: James Dixon is a motivational speaker, he's CEO of Absolute Motivation, which is also the name of his book, and you can find him on Instagram, @absolutemotivationofficial. James, thank you so much for your time today.

James Dixon: Uh, thank you, my friend.

Julie Rose: And thank you for getting Uncomfy with us today. I would love to hear from you. What is a recent experience you've had with discomfort or a big Uncomfy thing that you've gone through in your life, and how did it change you? How did you manage to stay open and curious enough for it to do something good in your life, maybe like what James Dixon was talking about? I'd love to hear your story. Email uncomfy@byu.edu or connect with us on social media to keep the conversation going. 

Uncomfy is a BYUradio podcast. Samuel Benson produces it, and the team includes Jake Hasleton, James Hoopes, Isabella Sosa, and Sam Payne. Our theme music was composed by Kelsey Nay. I'm Julie Rose. Can't wait to get Uncomfy with you again next week.​