A Prescription for Human Connection

[Applause]

[Music]

they live in every major city in

shelters and cheap motels

in their cars and behind dumpsters

they’re oftentimes overlooked and feel

hopeless

living in loneliness amongst us me my

dad are on a mission to change this

tonight i’m here to talk about

homelessness and what i’ve learned

interviewing hundreds of individuals

who are at their lowest this is my

friend jeannie

she’s from vernal utah i moved up to

salt lake seeking out help

help she didn’t find she was born

without legs and did what she could to

get by

jenny’s story means a lot to me because

she was one of my first mentors

i wish i could have done more to help

her genie is one of 500

000 individuals in the united states

alone on any given night

that doesn’t have a place that they

belong and are considered homeless

half a million homeless that is a lot

when would i

ever imagine a country like ours how do

we change this

how do we inspire hope and lift others

how do we help someone who

is homeless for the past seven years me

and my dad have been a

researcher conducting research missions

to try to find these answers

we met the most interesting individuals

through our work in places like

starbucks

and parks anytime i talk to them i

wonder who they are

and how i can impact their life in a

meaningful way

what i’ve seen personally what others

have revealed me

through our time together is positive

human connection

and lots of it this isn’t anything new

but how do we deploy it

listen connect serve listen with empathy

connect with dignity and serve with

authenticity

these are steps i followed interviewing

hundreds of individuals

like jeannie it was taught hard talking

to someone who

didn’t have teeth or is visibly loaded

with heroin but they need more than just

money

they need friends they need positive

human interaction

to be healthy and to thrive with other

humans

i got my start when i was just four

years old i know that’s hard to believe

but

it’s when i got my first spider-man

outfit my dad says i refuse to take it

off

you couldn’t tell right

for fun we deploy on secret missions

using public transit

fighting imaginary bad guys and looking

for people we could serve

i was one of those kids you seen costco

or walmart just in

superhero mode

individuals experiencing homelessness

were not hard to find they were

everywhere

my dad would encourage me to say hi

smile big and look for opportunities to

be kind

when my my research got serious when i

stumbled upon a shelter in salt lake

city

i saw hundreds of individuals sitting on

the hot sidewalk

i hold my dad’s hand tight and i got

brave and walked through the wave of

despair

i stopped my dad and i asked who are

those people he said

they’re individuals experiencing

homelessness i asked my dad

how do we help him and he said ask them

this began our mission to listen

to ask the for the challenge when you’re

six given such a problem is

how do you help someone who’s homeless

how do you talk to them

we devised a plan and ended up

partnering we ended up partnering up

with the local jam juice and on hot

summer day

we drove up to pioneer park a beautiful

park in salt lake city

and started passing them out the first

and first person i approached

had just got released from the hospital

she still had her hospital wristband

on i handed her her jump juice and she

smiled at me when i offered her

something cold

she said thank you we ended up going

around the park and passing out all

these jamba juices

the experience was great it made me feel

good but we really didn’t

get to our objective we really didn’t

get to talk to people

so we ended up testing out street

contacting that wasn’t too good either

because

sometimes they were on their job site

and other times they just don’t want to

talk to us

so we thought how did we sit down with

the person that wasn’t doing too good

and have them share their story and

become their friend

we wanted to sit down with someone

through extended period time and connect

we started doing one-on-one sit-down

meals with people we just found on the

sidewalk

lift them up and sat them down we knew

they weren’t doing too good but when we

sat down with them over a hot pizza

they’re more likely to share about

themselves we met the most interesting

individuals

who were addicted to heroin and they

shared how they got homeless

and how they got that addiction in a

pg-13 manner

it was pretty hard

i ended up becoming friends with people

that were just hard to get to know

because they were a lone wolf like my

friend leonard

we ended up becoming their friends and

through these meals we put notepad aside

and saw them as friends we noticed that

they opened up more

we wanted others to join us because

their stories are frankly amazing so we

created a project empathy

a one-on-one person-to-person human

interaction

where you can sit down with someone to

with someone that you wouldn’t normally

talk to

i see project empathy as a prescription

for human connection

we can change this we can help people

like genie

but we need to have empathy dignity and

authenticity

this is my journey to make my difference

now it’s time for you to start yours

thank you

[Applause]

you