What if you gave up 3 feet from gold

what if

you gave up three feet from gold

in the book by napoleon hill think and

grow rich there was a young gold miner

by the name of r

u darwi way way back decided to invest

all the family’s money in his quest for

gold

chasing the dream he wanted to change

his family’s life he wanted to change

his life

he wanted to create a legacy off he went

with his uncle

to the gold mine and they started to

mine for gold

they had some early success but not

enough not enough to change a life

so the continued demand the further the

mind

the further the desperation and anxiety

set on

they continue to mine but they were

mining further in the depth

eventually they gave up they accepted

failure

they sold the equipment to a local scrap

man and explained the situation

but the scrap man and his wisdom took

some counsel

he returned to the scene and began

mining again

three feet later he struck gold

rich beyond his wildest dreams he

changed his family’s life he changed

everything

when argue derby and his uncle heard

this they were distraught as you can

imagine

they had accepted failure when they had

the actual of choice and ability

to keep going but they accepted failure

they gave up powerful powerful story but

how does it even relate to today you

might ask

it’s hundreds of years ago well

i’d ask you this have you ever felt like

a failure

have you ever felt not good enough have

you ever felt useless

what if i told you you’re not you

actually only fail when you give up

keep going if you have a goal and you

know it’s the right goal

and you believe in your heart it’s the

right goal don’t change the goal

change the plan anyway

i didn’t always think this way um and

people that know me will know that

rewinding back the following words are

words that i would have used to describe

myself

useless failure not good enough

disappointment let down wick

i could go on you get the drift you get

the message

i was locked up i felt locked in my mind

which brings me on to a question i

wonder anybody listen to this have you

ever been in prison before

have you ever been in jail because i

have

i’ve never told anybody that before and

i’m telling you right now

i was a prisoner of my mind for 24 years

locked up no key to get out i felt like

one of those guys

or girls on death row

no chance of reprieve i would look at

other people wishing i was them they had

it all figured out i hadn’t

you know that amy curry ted talk the one

that went viral

and no pressure mentioning that talk

during mine

but i love it and i hear it at the very

same time

i love it because she talks about power

posturing

and power posturing right now and i feel

great

but when i was younger and she talks

about faking it do you make it

i didn’t even have the courage to fake

it

i didn’t have the courage they own my

own mind

what chance have you got when that’s how

you actually feel

but it’s not all anxiety and pain

and unhurt when i look back i can

actually laugh now i can laugh out loud

some things are so funny you know the

game hiding sick

that my generation would have played now

it’s a playstation generation but when i

was younger it was hide and seek that’s

what we played

well i was very very very good at it and

without fear of contradiction

i would say i was the submarines high

school

hide and seek champion from 1987 to 1992

and there’s a skill in there somewhere

and i still have to work out whether i’m

proud of it or not

but you see for five years i avoided

giving a book review in class

five years my whole time at school and i

had full attendance by the way i never

missed a day

every month we were supposed to speak to

the class

about the book that we read and how we

found it

and as that dreaded day with near every

month i would come up with the best

excuse you’ve ever seen i was sick

i had a dentist i had football practice

or i just skipped the class

um i would have done anything to avoid

speaking and i did

and i calculated that’s about 165 times

that i had and i was never found if

anybody’s got a better record than that

i’d love to

hear it um also i would like to

apologize

to my english teacher actually mrs

holmes i believe she’s retired now but

if anybody knows her please pass this on

i’d like to apologize to her for wasting

her time and i would

love to return to that school and

perhaps give this ted talk maybe

what a full circle that would be

as i mentioned about the anxiety

speaking publicly i would rather have

died

honestly i would rather give my own life

than had to speak

and i later found a stanford universe

university study in the us the

prestigious university

had a study about this and 73 percent of

people said the exact same thing

i wasn’t such a freak after all but i

didn’t know it at the time

i wonder how many people actually feel

this way today

and hide those feelings and live in that

prison that i let i loved on

it’s an awfully dreaming place and i

wouldn’t wish it in anybody

speak to somebody about that please

through pain however comes growth

i’m proof of that today speaking in the

famous red dot for somebody that didn’t

want to speak for five years and avoided

speaking

look at henry ford the great henry ford

that produced the cars that we all know

today on the road and his first wave of

investment

he didn’t produce one single car not one

but he didn’t fail he didn’t fail he’s

famously actually quoted

failure is only an opportunity to go

again but this time more intelligently

and that lives with me i feel forward

every day

i continue to feel if i feel here today

it’ll be forward i’ll be better the next

time keep going

through pain as i said already comes

growth

and with that in mind there’s a date

that’s etched in my memory for those two

feelings

the 24th of the sixth 2000

it’s a date that’ll be etched in my

memory forever

and it should be my wife would say and i

know she’s watching this now

today i got married lucky her

lucky me and

apart from the obvious anxiety about

speaking at my own wedding

and i actually nearly did a runner about

five minutes before my speech

and that is a true story and it’s a

whole other talk maybe another ted talk

actually

um as i was sitting there and the

anxiety was building and the dread was

building and i was thinking what door

was i gonna run out

my father-in-law was sitting to my

right-hand side

marshall mccollum remember that name

marshall stood up and as my right foot

was tapping

and the sweat was running down my brow

and i was welling up with tears

marshall was talk marshall said i

believe in him

i believe he will go a long way in life

i believe in him so much i know for

certain

he has what it takes it was like an

outer body experience for me

honestly i had never ever ever heard

those words

and my name in the same breath breath

it’s just not the word i’m from in my

world we didn’t express

feelings and for him to say that

and he and for me to hear that he loved

me

and he had the courage selfless courage

to express that

and that’s and that’s a skill and an art

and a quality

that i that i try to pass on today he

made me feel

10 feet tall he made my dreams come true

in that moment right there he didn’t

know it at the time

but he knows that now it changed my life

see sometimes whether we like it or not

or even admitted or not

and i defy anybody to tell me i’m wrong

if i’m wrong i stand corrected

but at some point in our life we all

seek or certainly like and accept

validation from others

that we’re right that we’re good enough

that we’re on the right path

it’s good it’s always good it’s always

good to hear it right

well people often ask me

how do you develop the ability to keep

going gary you talk about keeping going

no matter what feeling forward

all the buzz cliche phrases words terms

they all fly about in the personal

development world but how do you

actually do it

people want to know how to do it well

i’m going to share my unique insight

into how i do it

and how i believe you can do it if you

either struggle with it or if you want

to pass it on and give that gift to

somebody else

i’m going to share my unique insight you

see

in life i believe we all have a purpose

it might take you a while to find it it

took me 42 years

but i found it now my my advice to

anybody is

follow your passion what is it you love

doing is it football

personal development art what is it

follow your passion you will find your

purpose in life

your purpose lies beyond your passion

but here’s here’s the secret

here’s that x factor that magic wand

that people are looking for

why is it your purpose why is it your

passion

now here’s where you have to be brief

you need to go deep inside for your way

because i had a exercise with my dear

friend

and mentor cleon o’hara he was an

original derricker

and is now residing in the u.s and

cleona asked me on a call one night from

the u.s and i met her and call

gary what what’s your why why do you do

what you do

straight off about i do it for my family

so cliche everybody does it for their

family of course

and she said that to me said guy you and

millions of others now tell me

why you do and as the conversation

evolved

after about half an hour i found my way

a wave of emotion came over me like you

wouldn’t believe

like the 24th of the 6th 2000 that sort

of emotion

it was that sort of moment again and

before

i share it with you i want to apologize

to cleona

i’m full of apologies today mrs holmes

now cleona

i want to apologize to cleona because

her inbox will be falling upright about

now everybody’ll be wanting to know

their true way

but here here’s my way i’ll share it

with you right here

and right now my way is to make my wife

and my children proud of me simply

because

nobody has ever been proud of me or even

demonstrated it

before and that’s not a violin story

it’s just the word i’m from

we don’t think we haven’t experienced

express those emotions and feelings and

that’s okay

i accept that it’s all good it’s all

love of me

but i want to make my wife and my

children proud of me the way nobody has

ever been

and they’re watching this right now and

i hope they are

you see finding that way is a beautiful

beautiful thing

and i hope everybody knows their way and

if you don’t please go and explore it

see now i’m like a formula one car with

an unlimited fuel tank

and i’m going through life on a

relentless charge just watch me

i’m i’m attempting to be the best me

every day of the week every second of

the week i’m attempting to be the best

me right now

feeling some might say that’s okay don’t

stop three feet from gold now never stop

three feet from gold

no matter how successful i am i’ll i

love and that’s space three feet from

gold i’ll be there forever

i’ll always be going forward

do you know your way explore it find it

change your life or even if you’ve got a

really good life make it even better

i often think what of all young boys and

girls

knew their way what if i knew my way

when i was at school

scared to speak maybe i would have got

up speaking

i make up for it now i do plenty of

talking now

um anyway as i’ve said

true growth for me comes through pain

it’s always been that way for me life’s

always a beautiful struggle

it’s always finding calm and the chaos

it’s always finding that place

that it never comes easy for me and if

it does i don’t want that

i i want the struggle i want i want that

i want that i want the hurt and the pain

because i want to grow

um and when i talk about pain i

experienced a measurable pain

when i say i i mean we my family

five years ago the late and the great

marshall mccollum

died and

that’s okay because marshall

saved my life he gave me that

life-saving drug

of self-belief and this talks for him

and i wouldn’t swap that heartache and

heartbreak for anything

honestly i hope we all

feel that heartbreak and heartache if it

saved your life

and you hear those words that i heard

we all need immersal right everybody

needs a marshall

are you one could you be one

if you’re not one you should be your

words can change your life

who can you inject self-belief on day

today

right after this talk who can you go and

tell

that they’re good enough that you

believe in them

that they have what it takes you might

be thinking it

but be selfless and give them the gift

tell them

it might be the only time that they ever

hear it

in their entire life it was for me

i had never heard it before it changed

my

life one word one sentence is all it

takes

go and change your life be the best you

be a martial

the world needs it today right the

global pandemic

this crazy world we’re living on today

we all need hope we all need some belief

i believe history history will judge us

all i truly believe that

i’d encourage everybody to be the best

damn right now

or if you’re not a marshal and you’re a

gary

lucky you you’re thinking maybe not

keep dreaming keep believing

keep searching keep going keep moving

forward

be a dream maker be a dream chaser never

ever ever as long as you love give up

what if you are three

feet from gold yes