Oprah Winfrey Leaves the Audience SPEECHLESS One of the Best Motivational Speeches Ever

the three things that i want to leave

with you just

these three i could do ten i could do a

whole life class

but just these three things will carry

you

if you let them

first and foremost knowing

who you are

knowing who you are being able to answer

this question

who am i and what do i want

who am i really my answer is i am god’s

child

i am that which is born of all that

is i am as pierre schaden said

a spiritual being having a human

experience

come trailing the breath of the

ancestors yet

but trailing the breath of the angels

and understanding

that because i am connected

to the source of all that is

all that is possible is possible for me

that’s who i am and what do i want

i don’t want to just be

successful in the world

i don’t want to just make a mark or

have a legacy the answer to that

question for me is

i want to fulfill the highest

truest expression of myself

as a human being i want to fulfill the

promise

that the creator dreamed when he dreamed

the cells that made up me what do i want

you must have some kind of

vision for your life even if you don’t

know the plan

you have to have a direction in which

you choose to go

what i’ve learned is that’s a great

metaphor for life

you want to be in the driver’s seat of

your own life because if you’re not

life will drive you

so knowing who you

really are in this space and time

that we embody that’s number one

what do you want who are you

number two you must

find a way to serve

[Music]

martin luther king said that not

everybody can be famous but everybody

can be great because greatness is

determined

by service now we live in a world where

everybody wants to be famous

and where we admire people for just

being famous we think being known

brings us value the truth is all of that

will fade in time in three years you

won’t be able to name the housewives

of banana the real truth

is that service

and significance

service and the significance that you

bring to your service

is that which is lasting so to be able

to

whatever your occupation or job or

talent or gift is

our honorees today getting doctorate

degrees

to apparently opposite fields

hiv and aids and the spoken word

but what they have in common is service

using the spoken word in service to

community and the world

using your knowledge and information

about hiv and aids and medicine

in service to the world and if you look

at all the most

successful people in the world whether

they know it or not

they have that paradigm of service

everybody’s talking about mark

zuckerberg and ipo

[Music]

service jay-z rapid

service through the word to people

through song for many years i was really

just happy to be on tv and people would

stop and say oh you on tv yeah i’m on tv

i like being on tv it’s a nice job

and it was about the time that i

received my honorary

doctorate from spelman around 1993 so i

don’t know if that had something to do

with it i thought of myself as dr

winfrey

that i went back and i took a long look

at what it was i was doing on

on tv and made a decision

that i was no longer going to just be on

tv

but i was going to use tv

as a platform as a force for good

and not be used by tv

and i will tell you my decision

to make that significant change in the

way i

operated on television using television

as a service

changed my career exponentially

[Music]

service through medicine service through

art using whatever it is

you produce your product

as a way of giving back to the world

when you shift the paradigm of whatever

it is you choose to do

to service and you bring significance to

that

success will i promise you follow you

service and significance equals

success that’s number two number three

it’s so simple but so hard to do

always do the right

thing be excellent

people notice think of how you notice

you go to taco bell somebody gives you

extra napkin and some sauce

you notice you want to go back to that

person

because even at taco bell excellence

shows itself be excellent let

excellence be your brand

everybody talks about building a brand i

never even knew what that was

when people would say you’re a brand i

would say no i’m just oprah

what i recognize now is that my choice

to in every way in every example

in every experience to do the right

thing

and the excellent thing is what has

created

the brand and what i know is that when

you

are excellent you become

unforgettable people remember you

you stand out regardless of what it is

you become an unforgettable woman

and that is what we all want we want to

be unforgettable

and not forgettable so doing the right

thing even

when nobody knows you’re doing the right

thing

will always bring the right thing to you

i promise you that why because the third

law of motion is always at work

for every action there’s an equal and

opposite reaction

that is so true in all of our lives

you just have to do the right thing and

the right thing will follow you

even when people don’t support it

i remember many times on my show there

are many shows y’all never saw

and the reason you didn’t see them is

because i

got the last vote and i remember

2010 my team hardest working team in

television had done this

interview with a woman who turns out she

was a sunday school teacher by day

and a sex addict at night they were like

you won’t believe it we got her going

out

we got her with the men and we get to

show her and she was willing to show us

everything

i sat down with a woman for an interview

that was taped

and during the process of the interview

i said

why are you doing this and she said oh i

want to help

people i want to tell my story and i

want to help people i said do you have

children she says yes

i have a 10 year old son i knew right

then this is never going to see the

light of day

so we got off the air and i said to the

lady we are not going to air that show

and she said why my producer said why

she knew she was being filmed she knew

what she was saying she knows what you

i said because her son will never

get over it her son will never get over

it

and it’s not worth a rating point to me

not worth the rating point to me to know

that there’s a ten-year-old boy

who’s destroyed because his mother went

on the oprah winfrey show

and told all her business you do

the right thing even when other people

think it may not be

and oftentimes when you make a decision

to do the right thing

immediately you’re faced with doubt was

that the right thing

was that the right decision i don’t know

was that the right thing

you always know it’s the right thing

when in the end

there is peace you are rewarded

by peace in knowing that you did the

right thing