Denzel Washington Leaves the Audience SPEECHLESS One of the Best Motivational Speeches Ever
i found that nothing in life
is worthwhile unless you take risks
nothing nelson mandela said
there is no passion to be found playing
small
and settling for a life that’s less than
the one you’re capable of living
now i’m sure in your experiences in
school and applying to college and
picking your major and deciding what you
want to do with life i’m sure people
have told you
to make sure you have something to fall
back on make sure you got something to
fall back on honey
but i never understood that concept
having something to fall back on
if i’m going to fall i don’t want to
fall back on anything
except my faith i want to fall forward
i figure at least this way i’ll see what
i’m going to hit
fall forward this is what i mean
reggie jackson struck out 2600 times in
his career the most
in the history of baseball but you don’t
hear about the strikeouts
people remember the home runs
fall forward thomas edison conducted one
thousand failed experiments did you know
that i didn’t know that
because the one thousand and first was
the light bulb
fall forward every failed experiment
is one step closer to success you’ve got
to take risks
and i’m sure you’ve probably heard that
before but i want to talk to you about
why that’s so important
first you will fail
at some point in your life accept it you
will lose
you will embarrass yourself you will
suck at something
there’s no doubt about it and i know
that’s probably not a traditional
message for a graduation ceremony but
hey
i’m telling you embrace it because it’s
inevitable
and i should know in the acting business
you fail all the time
early on in my career i auditioned for a
part in a broadway musical
perfect role for me i thought except for
the fact that
i can’t sing so
i’m i’m in the wings i’m about to go on
stage
but the guy in front of me he’s singing
like like
like paparazzi he’s just wrong
and he’s just going on and on and on and
i’m just shrinking i’m getting smaller
and smaller
so they say oh thank you very much thank
you very much and you will
you’ll be hearing from us so i come out
with my little sheet music and
it was it was a just my imagination by
the temptations that’s what i came up
with
so i hand it to the the the accompanist
and uh
she looks at it and looks at me and
looks out at the director and was like
all right so i i start you know
i’m gonna sing i’m like you know and
it’s just my imagination
once again and then coming away with me
and i’m not saying anything so i’m
thinking i’m getting better so i could
start getting into it
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[Applause]
running this oh yeah yeah thank you
thank you
thank you very much mr washington thank
you so i assumed i didn’t get the job
but the next part of the audition he
called me back the next part of the
audition
is the acting part of the audition so
i’m like hey
okay maybe i can’t sing but i know i can
act
so they pair me with this guy and again
i didn’t know about musical theater
and musical theater is big so they can
reach everyone all the way in the back
of
the stadium and i’m more from a
realistic
uh naturalistic kind of acting where you
you know you actually
talk to the person next to you so i
don’t know what my line was my line was
well
hand me the cup and his line was well i
will hand you the cup my dear the cup
will be there
to be handed to you
i said okay
well should i give you the cup back oh
yes you should give it back to me
because you know that is
my cup and it should be giving back to
me
i didn’t get the job
but here’s the thing i didn’t quit
i didn’t fall back
i walked out of there to prepare for the
next audition and the next audition and
the next audition
i prayed
i prayed and i prayed
but i continued to fail and fail
and fail but it didn’t matter because
you know what there’s an old saying
you hang around the barbershop long
enough sooner or later you’re going to
get a haircut
so you will catch a break and i did
catch a break
last year i did a play called fences on
broadway
[Music]
someone talked about it won the tony
award
and i didn’t have to sing by the way but
here’s the kicker
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it was at the court theater it was at
the same
theater that i failed that first
audition
30 years prior the point is every
graduate here today has the training
and the talent to succeed but do you
have the guts
to fail here’s my second point about
failure
if you don’t fail you’re not even trying
i’ll say it again if you don’t fail
you’re not even trying my wife told me
this great expression
to get something you never had you have
to do something
you never did les brown’s a motivational
speaker he made an analogy about this
he says imagine you’re on your deathbed
and standing around your deathbed
are the ghosts representing your
unfulfilled potential
the ghost of the ideas you never acted
on the ghost of the talents you didn’t
use
and they’re standing around your bed
angry
disappointed and upset they say we
we came to you because you could have
brought us to life
they say and now we have to go to the
grave together
so i ask you today
how many ghosts are going to be around
your bed when your time comes
you’ve invest you you’ve invested a lot
in your education and people have
invested in you and let me tell you the
world needs your talents man does it
ever
i just got back from africa like two
days ago so if i’m rambling on it’s
cause i’m jet lag
i just got back from south africa it’s
beautiful country but there are places
there with terrible
poverty that need help and africa is
just the tip of the iceberg
the middle east needs your help japan
needs your help
alabama needs your help tennessee needs
your help louisiana needs your help
philadelphia needs your help
the world needs a lot and we need it
from you we really do we need it from
you young people i mean i’m not speaking
for the rest of us up here but i know
i’m getting a little grayer
we need it from you the young people
because remember this so you got to get
out there
you got to give it everything you got
whether it’s your time
your your your talent your prayers
or your treasures because remember this
you will never see a u-haul behind a
hearse
you can’t take it with you the egyptians
tried it
and all they got was robbed
so the question is what are you going to
do with what you have i’m not talking
about how much you have
some of you are business majors some of
you are theologians nurses sociologists
some of you have money some of you have
patience some of you have kindness some
of you have
loved some of you have the gift of
long-suffering whatever it is whatever
your gift is
what are you going to do with what you
have
all right now here’s my last point about
failure
sometimes it’s the best way
to figure out where you’re going
your life will never be a straight path
i began at fordham university as a
pre-med student
i i took a course called the
cardiac morphos i still can’t say it
cardiac cardiac morphogenesis i couldn’t
read it i couldn’t say it i sure
couldn’t pass it
so then i decided to go into pre-law
then journalism
and with no academic focus my grades
took off in their own direction
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yeah down i was a 1.8 gpa
one semester and the university very
politely suggested that it might be
better to take some time
off i was 20 years old
i was at my lowest point and then one
day and i remember the exact day
march 27 1975 i was helping my mother in
her beauty shop my mother owned a beauty
shop
up in mount vernon and there’s there was
this older woman
who was considered one of the elders in
the town and
i didn’t know her personally but i i was
looking in the mirror and every time i
looked through the mirror i could see
her
behind me and she was staring at me she
just kept looking at me every time i
looked at her she kept giving me these
strange looks
so she finally took the dryer off her
head and said she
said something i’ll never forget first
of all she said somebody give me a piece
of paper give me a piece of paper
she said young boy i have a prophecy
a spiritual prophecy
she said you are going to travel the
world
and speak to millions of people now mind
you
i’m 20 years old i’m flunked out of
school in fact like a wise ass i’m
thinking to myself maybe she’s got
something in that crystal ball
about me getting back into school next
fall
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but maybe she was on to something
because later that summer while working
as a counselor at the ymca camp in
connecticut
we put on a talent show for the campers
and after the show another counselor
came up to me and asked
have you ever thought about acting
you’re good at that so when i got back
to fordham that fall i got in and i
changed my major once again
for the last time and in the years that
followed just as that woman prophesized
i have traveled the world and i have
spoken to millions of people
through my movies millions who up till
this day
couldn’t see me i who up till this day i
couldn’t see
while i was talking to them and they
couldn’t see me they could only see the
movie
they couldn’t see the real me
but i see you today
and i’m encouraged by what i see
and i’m strengthened by what i see
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and i love what i see
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you