Crossing My Own Rubicon

[Music]

[Applause]

every day

i want to wake up happy for most of my

life this has been a real struggle of

mine

and there wasn’t anything obvious that

was wrong i was always the happy smiling

kid that never seen me bothered by

anything

but in reality it was rather difficult

for me to express my emotions

like how exactly do you tell someone

you’re sad when all they ever expected

you is to be happy

and you don’t even know why you’re sad

well the truth was i really didn’t have

any confidence in myself

i didn’t believe in myself in any manner

i would often talk down on myself

you’re not good enough don’t even try

you’re going to fail it’s not worth it

and that’s how i lived most of my life

and it wasn’t good

but for more context let’s jump back to

last year

last year i lost a pretty significant

amount of weight in a pretty short

period of time about 60 pounds about

four months

so quite a bit what i noticed was i was

losing all this weight and i’ve looked

the best i’ve ever looked

but i still felt the same i still felt

fat and worthless it was my father who

actually asked me if i felt any

different my self-esteem was risen

and it hasn’t i still had the same

horrid opinion of myself

and i was so confused because i thought

this was the only thing from keeping me

from being happy

but it wasn’t but that’s when i started

connecting the dots

i wouldn’t be happy until x happened

i’ll be happy when i have more money

i’ll be happy when i lose the weight

i’ll be happy when i’m in a relationship

sound familiar

this is the point where i realized that

i was doing this to myself

i was the one creating my problems in my

own head and if i just

changed the expectation of the outcome

things would have went better for me

this is when i realized we all have the

ability to control our thoughts

we can’t get what ourselves get in our

own minds and that’s what’s called the

destructive power of negative thoughts

it seems like as are growing up we’re

all guided in a very specific direction

go to school get good grades go to

college get married

at some point make 100 make 600k a year

easy right then be happy that sounds

like easy right easy enough plan

well to me it just sounds like we’re

checking off boxes off a fabricated list

a list that i sure didn’t make and it’s

confusing to me

it doesn’t work for everyone because

there’s doctors and lawyers out there

right now who hate their lives and hate

their jobs

and resent their parents from making

them go to law or med school

but they can’t just drop out or give up

their whole career because it’s all they

did for the past 15 years

so their lives continue with resent and

regret

we pushed happiness into a place that’s

seemingly unattainable

if i get good grades on a test i need to

get better grades if i make good money i

need to make more money

if i have a good job i need a better job

this is the point where we don’t

understand where we’re going with our

lives we need to change

success and money into happiness

happiness needs to be our new north star

we just can’t be chasing success and

fame and money

our whole lives there’s millionaires out

there right now who are willing to trade

everything they have for five more years

to live

but they can’t so our lives end with so

much regret and resentment

and that’s truly sad i would argue money

is just a currency and that’s all it is

time is a much better one time is a

currency we spend every single day

we have to start living our lives with

more gratitude gratitude in simple terms

is just being thankful for what we have

around us

it’s so easy for us to get sucked into

all the bad and disheartening events

going on our lives

like turning on our phones or turning on

the tv and seeing

celebrities dying or entire continents

on fire

and that bogs us down that’s how most of

us start our everyday lives

it’s become the norm to turn on the tv

and see all these bad things

and that’s just priming us to have a bad

day if we continue doing this every

single day

it’s going to make the rest of our lives

horrible that’s no life to live

so i would encourage you tomorrow

morning before you turn on the tv before

you go on your phone

think of or write down or scream out

loud what you’re

most thankful for and with dedicated

time and practice you’ll start to notice

every little thing around you is

something to be grateful for

i wake up every single day so thankful

that i’m on this earth

that i was born just two seconds later i

may not have been me

and i could have been a completely

different person with a concluding

outlook on life

and morals but no i am who i am

and i’m enough i was given the

opportunity to be here

and i’m happy and grateful to be here

why wouldn’t i give my best shot

and this is how i live every day we also

need to stop focusing on the negatives

i see so much suffering from those who

only seek out negativity

and they end up chasing themselves in

circles trying to find the answers

it’s sickening what’s the worst part

about it is

i see so much potential in these people

so much potential that they don’t see

themselves

and they get so clouded that that with

one or two issues that they don’t see

their potential themselves

so it’s squandered there’s millions of

people out there who hate mondays

i’m sure there’s something here as well

just because they have to go back to a

job they hate

and so all they do is complain and

complain and complain about how much

they hate their job

and only live on the weekends well what

if i were to tell you that this was your

last monday on earth

do you still think you would complain

about how much you hate your job

no i don’t think you would you would

start trying to frantically try

try to call all the loved ones you have

and make all the plans for the things

you set out to do but never executed on

your war will get flipped upside down

and this is how you would live your life

this is the perspective change we need

to live a better life

this way it’s back to gratitude in many

ways i often pondered the idea that

today i might walk out that door and be

hit by a car or that this might be my

last day on earth

i often think would i be proud of all

the things i’ve done so far the people

i’ve made connections with

and the legacy that i’m starting to

leave behind my answer is yes

100 without a doubt and if your answer

isn’t yes you need to start living your

life

more gratitude and just simply stop

complaining

i don’t have time to complain about

anything that isn’t under my control

everything that i have i’ve earned

everything that has yet to come

will the world doesn’t stop just because

you’re in a bad mood

so we have to change our attitude and

keep going

this past year i completely changed the

way i viewed and lived my life

i started living with more gratitude i

stopped seeking out all the negatives in

my life

and i just started believing in myself

i’ve learned that i didn’t need to lose

more weight or be in a relationship to

be happy

i just had to do it on my own but even

working on this talk i was still

struggling with my own inner thoughts

this doesn’t sound good enough how are

you going to give this speech start over

all these horrible things still but that

was the whole point of this talk

i was trying to get myself to challenge

myself to change for the better

and this was the challenge i needed and

thus crossing my own rubicon

and this morning i woke up happy

[Music]

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