Words That Inspire Us

Truly one of the most inspirational leaders and great orators of our time, Obama has an amazing ability to inspire people through his words. Watch Obama inspire and fire up his team again, just after a hard push to win the Democratic leadership position.

This is video was recommended to me by Dane Low, thanks Dane. Check out his site on FirstGiving that's raising funds to build a school in Vietnam and help pay to send kids there, It's for an awesome cause and only takes $1 to contribute and make a difference.

Have you ever run a marathon (42 km or 26 miles, depending on where you're from)? Or completed a triathlon? Try completing a triathlon while pulling another person in a dingy while you swim for 2.4 miles, pull them while biking 112 miles, and push them while running 26.2 miles.

This is a story more than about great physical accomplishments. It's a story about a father's love for his son that is so strong that for the past 25 years or more Dick, who is 65, has pushed and pulled his physically challenged son across the country and over hundreds of finish lines.

What are you willing to do for your family and loved ones?

To learn more about Dick and Rick Hoyt and their goal to integrate the physically challenged into everyday life check out their Team Hoyt site.

I remember reading this article, taken from The Peak (Simon Fraser University's Independent Student Newspaper), while I was still a student at UVic. It served as a good wake up call for me. Warning, there may be a few curses here and there, but definitely still worth reading.

Diary of a Graduate by Eugene Kaplan

"It is 11:30 a.m., Wednesday morning. I just finished my last final. My very last final. Ever. I am graduating, finally. And yet I'm here, downstairs in the library, and I can't leave this place. I am scared. It's high school all over again, but at least back then, I knew my future. I knew, or assumed, where I would be spending the next five years. Right now, I have no idea. 

Welcome to the "real world" indeed. 

I am scared and a little bit sad. Sad, because I am never going to have to get in my car and spend an hour on the road so I can be here for a stupid 8 a.m. tutorial. Sad, because I'll never use one-layer toilet paper ever again.

Sad, because I'll never eat such shitty food ever again, unless I get sent to jail. And sad, because there go five years of my life and all I have to show for it - not yet, mind you - is a piece of paper. It is quite the scam they have going. We show up for five years, pay them a lot of money, get our asses in debt for life, and all they have to give us in return is a piece of paper. 

John Lennon once said "life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans." Looking over the last five years, I very much hope I did not waste that part of my life. I should have gone on more trips, tried more things, hit on more girls, made more friends, read more books, and slept way less. But it's a little late now for regrets.

I think what bothers me the most is that I am shoved into a world I have no desire to enter, at least at this point. I do not want to be an adult. I know what it is, how it works and what it entails, and let me tell you, it's not pretty. There are responsibilities, bills, mortgages, looking for work, wives, children, legal battles, etc. I cannot wake up at noon, walk around in my underwear and watch Jenny Jones anymore. There is shit to be done. A lot of shit to be done, mind you, and I don't wanna do it. I know hindsight is 20/20 but, fuck, I am willing to give up a whole lotta stuff to go back to being a kid. I just want ice cream, camping, and Saturday morning cartoons. You can take everything I have if I just get that. You can even take sex from me. Go ahead, I'm serious, take it.

I wanna be blissfully ignorant again. I don't wanna hear any more about 9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan, the 2010 Olympics, Martha Stewart, the drug problem in Vancouver, or whatever else gets shoved in my face. I just wanna be back being 10 again. Is that so much to ask? I wanna eat mac 'n' cheese, Cap'n Crunch, pizza, and burgers. I don't wanna go the gym, I don't wanna shave, I don't wanna get my haircut every three weeks, I don't wanna buy the right shampoo or the right hair gel, I don't wanna pay insurance for my car, I don't wanna think about smoking, drinking, or smoking up. I just wanna draw doodles and go for a swim. I don't wanna worry about where my next paycheque is going to come from or how I am going to afford moving out and whether I am going to have to move to (gasp) Toronto to get a job. I don't want to do any of that. I just wanna be a kid again. Can I? Please? Pretty please?

No, eh? 

I don't think we put enough emphasis on living in the moment. And no, getting shitfaced and waking up at 3 p.m. with a stranger is not what I am talking about. Ask me how many times I've been to Whistler in the past five years. Zero. Ask me how many times I've been to the Okanagan in the past five years. Zero. Ask me how many times I've been to the Island in the past five years. Once, for about 6 hours.

They keep telling us that once we get over that whole "post-secondary" bit, we can start our lives. Well, they've lied. No, I can't start my life. I can't get those five years back. I can't blissfully jump into my Golf, drive to my shiny apartment in Yaletown, turn on that big-ass plasma TV, and call my boss to tell him I won't be coming in tomorrow. I can't do that because I don't have any of that shit, and as it stands right now, I have no way of getting it. 

Brad Pitt's character in Fight Club said that we all believe we're gonna grow up as movie stars or rock stars, but we won't. Well, let me add to that. We all believe we're going to grow up being somebody anybody. A person with a job, a partner, a house, a car. We do not grow up believing we'll work at Starbucks for the rest of our lives, live with 3 roommates, and have a dog as a life-partner. We are completely fooled, because that's very possible.

The more books I read, the more I am disillusioned about everything. Knowledge is only power if you know the combination to a bank vault or have photos of your boss having sex with a hooker. Otherwise, knowledge is a curse. Like a dog, we understand everything that our master does but cannot express anything or change anything. We are forever in the cage, looking out, seeing it all, but are totally helpless. Unlike the Matrix characters, I have no option of going blissfully back into the matrix. I am forced to see how deep the rabbit hole goes. I cannot be a kid again, as much as I want to, and it's shitty.

It is 1 p.m., Wednesday afternoon. I just finished my last final. My very last final. Ever. I am graduating, finally. And yet, I'm here, downstairs in the library, and I can't leave this place. I am scared. It's high school all over again. But at least back then, I knew my future. I knew, or assumed, where I would be spending the next five years. Right now, I have no idea.

Welcome to the "real world" indeed. 

I am scared."

I received this in a email, a couple of years ago, from a friend. If anyone knows the source, please let me know.

The first day of school our professor introduced himself and challenged us to get to know someone we didn't already know.  I stood up to look around when a gentle hand touched my shoulder.  I turned around to find a wrinkled, little old lady beaming up at me with a smile that lit up her entire being.   She said, "Hi handsome.  My name is Rose.  I'm eighty-seven years old.  Can I give you a hug?"  I laughed and enthusiastically responded, "Of course you may!"  and she gave me a giant squeeze. "Why are you in college at such a young, innocent age?" I asked.    She jokingly replied, "I'm here to meet a rich husband, get married, have a couple of kids.."    "No seriously," I asked. I was curious what may have motivated her to be taking on this challenge at her age.  "I always dreamed of having a college education and now I'm getting one!"  she told me.

At the end of the semester we invited Rose to speak at our football banquet.  I'll never forget what she taught us.  She was introduced and stepped up to the podium.  As she began to deliver her prepared speech, she dropped her three by five cards on the floor. Frustrated and a little embarrassed she leaned into the microphone and simply said, "I'm sorry I'm so jittery. I gave up beer for Lent and this whiskey is killing me! I'll never get my speech back in order so let me just tell you what I know."

She concluded her speech by courageously singing "The Rose."  She challenged each of us to study the lyrics and live them out in our daily lives. At the year's end Rose finished the college degree she had begun all those years ago. One week after graduation Rose died peacefully in her sleep.  Over two thousand college students attended her funeral in tribute to the wonderful woman who taught by example that it's never too late to be all you can possibly be.

REMEMBER, GROWING OLDER IS MANDATORY. GROWING UP IS OPTIONAL. We make a Living by what we get, We make a Life by what we give.

This past October, I had the chance to see Tony Robbins speak live at Unleash the Power Within in Vancouver. It was an event that changed my life. That weekend, I walked on fire, I cheered and danced like I was at a Stanley Cup Game (and the Canucks actually won) for three days straight, I met amazing people from all around the world who were fired up to make a difference in this world. 

I thought I would share Tony Robbin's talk at TED, a conference I one day hope I get to go to and a site that everyone should go to see more inspiring videos and talks. Be sure to check out his little interaction with Al Gore.

What if you were a professor and you were asked to hypothetically give your last lecture? What would you say to your students? Would you treat it as any other lecture? Would you tell them a story? What life lessons would you live them with? What if this wasn't hypothetically your last lecture, but actually your last lecture?

I remember my dad sending me a link to this video the day I decided to leave my steady and secure job at Advanced E-commerce Research Systems, selling eBay data to Fortune 500 companies, to take the leap of faith and start up my own company called TeamPages. I don't think he knew at the time that I had just left, but this video came just at the right time.

Steve Jobs, my of business heroes and someone who I look up to greatly, speaks from the heart in this commencement speech at Stanford about some of the challenges he faced and lesson he learned in his amazing life and leaves us with the words, "Stay hungry, stay foolish!"

Here's a link to the transcript of Steve Jobs' commencement speech at Stanford. Thanks Li Wei!