When Tarik El-Abour was in middle school, his teacher asked him and his classmates a simple question. What do you want to be when you grow up? When it was time for him to answer, El-Abour gave a reply that thousands of children have said before. He wanted to be a baseball player. But his teacher shot back with something less than encouraging: “You’d better have a Plan B.” El-Abour, who was diagnosed with autism at the age of three, remained undeterred. Rather than listening to his pessimistic instructor, he distanced himself from her.

He thought that if he continued to talk to her, she might convince him he was unable to achieve his goal. In the end, he was right, and the teacher was wrong. El-Abour grew up to become a baseball player after receiving a degree in business administration from Bristol University in Cali...
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