From the Fonz to Children’s Book Author: The Dyslexic Journey of Henry Winkler

Taking risks is one of the qualities that makes people with dyslexia stand out from the pack and can take you to all sorts of different places.

Henry Winkler, best known for his role of the Fonz on the hit show Happy Days is one of those dyslexic people who takes risks and has become extremely successful as a result.

Recently, Winkler has become a household name for writing 2 different series of children’s books. An incredibly ironic feat considering he didn’t read a book until he was 31 years old due to his dyslexia. For him, books were terrifying monsters due to his reading difficulties but since making the decision to work on his dyslexia, he has started reading and writing more and more.

He made the decision that when he became an author that he would write so that kids who struggle to read could enjoy his stories too. If he had the chance to go back and talk to his 10 year old self, he would say: “You are not defined by school. No matter how difficult it might be it has nothing to do with how brilliant you are. Your grades do not define how brilliant you are. Good thinking and a good thought is why you are smart.”

Question: 1. Do you think you could push yourself to take risks like Henry Winkler did? Our challenge to you is to take, smart calculated risks to help push you to try new things and therein potentially find success.

You can read more about Henry Winkler here.