Road to Wellbeingville

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[Applause]

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so i’d like to take you with me on a

trip

if you don’t mind it begins at a place

i’ll call

brokenville technically or in

chattanooga tennessee

headed to southern california but trust

me

where i am is brokenville as bad as it

gets

let me explain my wife recently filed

for divorce

for good reason i’m frail because i’ve

lost

30 pounds without trying the tv network

where i’m hosting a national cable show

the david mcgee show is thinking about

dropping me off the air because every

few days or so i’ve got one excuse

or another to not get on the air oh and

i’m almost out of money and i’m not sure

i got a paycheck coming anytime soon

it’s early on a monday morning in late

january

and i’m running away from myself we’re

the only possessions i have

left in the world my honda insight

compact car my clothes

and this box of books i’d written over

the past decade studying

enduring iconic brands like is an author

like john deere moonpie

ford motor company louisville slugger

toyota the dallas cowboys

don’t bother looking any of them up most

are long gone out of print by now

it’s just that for me studying these

brands with inside access as an author

was the apprenticeship of a lifetime

i learned so many valuable lessons yet

here i am

my son william is occupying the front

seat on the trip

he’s a 21 year old junior in college at

the university of mississippi

who’s coming along for the ride our

32-hour journey west

he’s coming along honestly because he’s

worried about me he wants to make sure i

don’t have to make this trip alone

that’s fine he looks good on paper

he’s been in the honors college making

a’s on the track team is a letterman as

a sprinter

and he’s got the sweetest soul of about

anybody i know

but i’m worried about him too i’m afraid

he’s got a growing

alcohol and drug problem based on

evidence

so here’s my plan i’m going to counsel

him along the way on the virtues of good

living

and i’m going to hope some of it sticks

we’re so close in the car our elbows

touch in the center console

and we’ve got jackets in our lap because

there’s record cold

and snow forecast for the road ahead

i’m taking the first shift driving

because i’m all hopped up though on the

morning’s coffee

and vivance pill

i started on an adderall prescription 18

months ago

that’s part of how i got here a doctor

suggested

these pills dispensed to me at maximum

dosage

possible would help me focus more on

work instead of distracting life

problems

he later switched me from adderall to

vivance

when i complained a little bit still at

maximum dosage

suggesting these won’t be as addictive

but so much for that

every morning when i take those pills

it’s like communion with the devil

because it makes me crave alcohol and

nicotine

and i gotta tell you daily alcohol use

combined with even prescription maximum

dose

speed that’s a recipe for disaster

it’s taken my life away and it’s

harnessed my soul

by late afternoon we’ve moved into

western arkansas

snow has started to fall william has

dozed

nearly the entire time i’ve tried

talking to him

wake him up asking him questions and he

just answers groggy

almost incoherent

i suspect he’s on something opiates

like painkillers without a prescription

we need gas in a bathroom break so i

pull into a station

and i wake him up he grabs his backpack

be right back he says and he goes inside

the station

i fill the tank with gas go inside the

bustling store

get a coffee stand in line pay for it

and william’s nowhere in sight back at

the car

20 minutes later the door swings open

with a quick pull

what are you waiting on daddy-o

back on the road my son is now talking

so much i can barely keep up

he’s talking about the song on the radio

and the weather and the fact that he’s

never been to oklahoma less than an hour

away

i’m now concerned my son is high as a

kite on an upper

cocaine perhaps that he used in the gas

station bathroom

i’m so upset i could cry but i can’t

the vivants

we’ve moved into oklahoma now the day

has turned to night in the winter storm

is raging

the snow has fallen so heavy flakes are

clumping together they’re the size of

cotton balls and they’re piling up at

more than two inches an hour

and the wind is blowing blizzard

conditions

my honda insight car is struggling

barely getting through

and i’m concerned we could be in real

trouble william sees an exit up ahead

and

even though i see cars and trucks lining

both sides of the road in a giant pile

of white in the middle

i figure it’s our only chance so i push

the floorboard

petal down to the floorboard and we hold

our breasts and

swoosh we crash into a big wall of white

great we’re stuck we’ve just got one

option

we see a hotel over in the distance

barely through the snow

we’re gonna have to get our essentials

william gets his backpack

i get my bottle of vivants we’re gonna

have to leave

all my possessions in the car and leave

the car in the road overnight and hope

for the best

we pull on our jackets and we make a run

for it

and we’re clumsily slipping and falling

and falling and slipping

and picking one another up until we

finally made it inside the lobby of a

warm holiday inn express

and we are high-fiving and hugging and

celebrating and cheering

like we have just won an olympic race we

got to tell your mom i say she’s never

going to believe it

we’re connecting like we once did it’s

funny william says

this trip is a disaster but it’s also

amazing

and right there i see my opportunity

here’s the thing william it’s a lesson i

learned studying those enduring brands

failure cultivates opportunity

take the moon pie as an example more

than a century ago

the chattanooga bakery which makes the

moon pie started out

producing everyday snacks like lemon

cookies and

ginger snaps and demand for those

products was eroding and

it was very competitive among other

regional bakeries and so

the chattanooga bakery was faced with

extinction

or getting creative thus

the moon pie was born and now

100 years later it’s the only single

product chattanooga bakery makes

and it’s an icon i get it william says

what else did you learn

okay i got one read all that

adds no value it’s a basic premise of

the toyota way

how this once small japanese automaker

became one of the world’s largest and

most efficient

by focusing on the regular elimination

of

waste they developed a process

of continuous improvement

okay i get it william says what else did

you learn

yeah i got more here’s another plan big

execute small plan big

so that you have you know ambitious

elevating goals

something to reach for but execute

small do the little things every day

that contribute to that end

but make your daily life that much

better

tell me more william says all right look

we got to go to bed

we got a long day ahead last one but

it’s a favorite

the power of design in the early 20th

century

john deere was log jam among several

agricultural equipment manufacturers

worldwide

they had the power and they had the

quality but something was missing

so in the early 1950s john deere decided

to double down on cutting edge design

with its products

utilizing the talents of world-class

industrial designer henry dreyfus

literally almost overnight john deere

became number one

a position they haven’t relinquished yet

today

i’m up early the next morning drinking

coffee

and i see on the television news

we’ve survived one of the biggest snows

in the

history of oklahoma at more than a foot

and a half and i’m thinking about those

lessons i shared last night with my son

william

read all that adds no value plan big

execute small in the power of design

yeah when i look at myself in the mirror

i see a man broken

and frail how can i expect to get my son

clean when i’m addicted myself

why do i keep drawing a line between my

doctor prescribed drug use

in his illegal one when both of us are

being cored

by the very same sharp knife

i want to be a positive an influential

father not a negative

a father under the influence

i walk into the bathroom and i get my

vivants bottle and unscrew the top and i

dump the 25 remaining pills into the

toilet and

flush and they’re gone

get up get up the sun is up i shout to

william we got new frontiers to conquer

buddy

it’s hard to believe but that car is

still waiting on us

it’s still sitting out in the road we

have no idea how to get it unstuck

so we just start digging with our hands

but lo and behold and i promise this is

true is every bit of this story along

comes a man

riding on a well-styled john deere

tractor

and he gives us a push and we get back

on our way

slowly down the interstate

and i strike upon this opportunity to

father my son a bit more

using another lesson i learned studying

those enduring brands

it doesn’t matter whether we mess up

william because

everybody messes up but as long as one

casts blame

it’s hard to achieve self-respect

when we take complete responsibility

we can learn to respect ourselves and

others

we can find peace it’s not lost on me

that i’m talking to william but

lecturing myself

and it’s working i can see it now

i felt stuck unsure of how to break the

vicious daily cycle

and fix my broken life but i have all

the answers right here in this box

that’ll work for me anyway i just need

to put them

into daily practice

so we’ve moved into the higher

elevations of new mexico

and the sun set an hour ago it’s a

crystal

clear night which is helping the

temperatures drop

rapidly it’s already 16 degrees below

zero

the coldest either of us have ever

witnessed in our lifetime

i’m worried about my honda’s hybrid

battery but there’s nothing in sight no

cars no houses no hotels no gas stations

nothing we only got one option and

that’s to press on

it feels like we’re traveling in space i

say

whatever that feels like well william

says

we should stop and get out and find out

what that feels like

well son here’s the problem i got an

update for you

the car now says it’s 18 degrees below

zero

which means the wind chill’s probably 30

degrees below

zero so i don’t know well daddy oh

he says you only live once

he’s got a point on that so i’ll pull

the car

over to the shoulder put it in park and

leave the engine running

we pull on our jackets look at one

another and smile

let’s go i say we bolt into the frigid

night

and we’re laughing and shouting and

having a time of our life running in

circles around the car like mad men and

exhaling icicles

until finally we’re huffing and puffing

and we’re catching our breath

and we meet at the back of the car

and i link my arm with my sons

and i say we’re at the center of the

universe right now

it’s never been so cold william in the

history of record keeping

is it is it this spot at this moment

and we’re here for it we lean back

against the car

and i look up into the sky and i promise

you

i have never in my life seen

stars so many and i have never seen so

many stars

shine so bright and for the first time

that logical part of my brain

that works to keep faith at arm’s length

away from my soul

gives way i have an insight

and i don’t mean the car i’m driving

i’m just a man traveling in a universe

that is so much bigger than myself a

universe that’s managed by a higher

power

and i just a man must trust this

because i am powerless and my life has

become

completely unmanageable

as we near southern california the next

day

it’s clear to me that i’m on the

outskirts of a new destination

and it has nothing to do with where we

are on the map

i’ve left brokenville i’ve got a plan

that’ll work for me and i’m taking up

residency in a new location

well-beingville

that trip was taken precisely 10 years

ago

two years later i found my son william

dead

from an accidental drug overdose

i miss him so much each and every day

you just can’t even imagine yet a part

of him lives on

because my son william helped save me on

that journey

as a result i put a simple plan into

place

based upon the valuable lessons that i’d

learned from these enduring iconic

brands

and it worked i got my life back

i got my wife back and i

found lasting joy durable enough even to

navigate life’s most

difficult circumstances like losing a

child

that’s why i’m sharing this story with

you

because i want everyone everywhere

who’s stuck in brokenville to know

that there is a much much better place

well-beingville is waiting on you

thank you

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you