The economic injustice of plastic Van Jones
so the awesome story it begins about 40
years ago when my mom and my dad came to
Canada my mom left Nairobi Kenya
my dad left a small village outside of
Amritsar India and they got here in the
late 1960s they settled in the shady
suburb about an hour east of Toronto and
they settled into a new life they saw
their first dentists they ate their
first hamburger and they had their first
kids my sister and I grew up here and we
had quiet happy childhoods we had close
family good friends I’m quiet street we
grew up taking for granted a lot of the
things that my parents couldn’t take for
granted when they grew up things like
power always on in our houses things
like schools across the street in
hospitals down the road and popsicles in
the backyard
we grew up and we grew older I went to
high school I graduated I moved out of
the house I got a job I found a girl I
settled down and I realized that sounds
like a bad sitcom or a Cat Stevens song
but life was pretty good life was pretty
good 2006 was a great year under clear
blue skies in July in the wine region of
Ontario I got married starting to buy
150 family and friends 2007 was a great
year I graduated from school and I went
on a road trip with two of my closest
friends here’s a picture of me and my
friend Chris on the coast of the Pacific
Ocean we actually saw seals out of our
car window and we pulled over to take a
quick picture of them and then block
them with our giant heads so you can’t
actually see him but it was breathtaking
believe me 2008 2009 were a little
tougher I know that they were tougher
for a lot of people not just me first of
all the news was so heavy it’s still
heavy now and it was heavy before that
but you know when you flip open a
newspaper when you turned on the TV it
was about ice caps melting wars going on
around the world earthquakes hurricanes
in an economy that was wobbling on the
brink of collapse and then eventually
did collapse and so many of us losing
our homes or our jobs or our retirements
or our livelihoods 2008 2009 were heavy
years for me for another reason - I was
going through a lot of personal problems
at the time my marriage wasn’t going
well and we just were growing further
and further apart
one day my wife came home from work and
summoned the courage through a lot of
tears to have a very honest conversation
and she said I don’t love you anymore
and it was one of the most painful
things that ever heard and certainly the
most heartbreaking thing I’d ever heard
until only a month later when I heard
something even more heartbreaking my
friend Chris so I just showed you a
picture of had been battling mental
illness for some time and for those of
you whose lives have been touched by
mental illness you know how challenging
it can be I spoke to him on the phone at
10:30 p.m. on
Sunday night we talked about the TV show
we watched that evening and Monday
morning I found out that he disappeared
very sadly he took his own life and it
was a really heavy time and as these
dark clouds were circling me and I was
finding it really really difficult to
think of anything good I said to myself
that I really needed a way to focus on
the positive somehow so I came home from
work one night and I logged onto the
computer and I started up a tiny web
site called 1,000 songs calm I was
trying to remind myself of the simple
universal little pleasures that we all
love but we just don’t talk about enough
things like waiters and waitresses who
bring your free refills without asking
being the first table to get called up
to the dinner buffet at a wedding
wearing warm underwear from just out of
the dryer or when cashiers opened up the
new checkout lane at the grocery store
you get to be first in line even if
you’re laughs at the other line swoop
right in there
and you know slowly over time I started
putting myself in a better mood
I mean fifty thousand blogs are started
a day and so my blog was just one of
those fifty thousand and nobody read it
except for my mom although I should say
that my traffic did skyrocket and go up
by a hundred percent when she forwarded
it to my dad
and then I got excited when it started
getting tens of hits and then I started
getting excited when I started getting
dozens and then hundreds and then
thousands and then millions started
getting bigger and bigger and bigger and
then I got a phone call and the voice of
the other and the line said you just won
the best blog in the world award I was
like that sounds totally fake which
African country do you want me to wire
all my money to
but turns out I jumped on a plane and I
ended up walking a red carpet between
Sarah Silverman and Jimmy Fallon and
Martha Stewart and I went on stage to
accept a Webby Award for Best blog and
the surprise and the you know just the
amazement of that was only overshadowed
by my return to Toronto when in my inbox
10 literary agents were waiting for me
to talk about putting this into a book
flash forward to the next year and the
book of Awesome has now been on number
one on the bestseller list for 20
straight weeks
well okay I said I wanted to do three
things today I said I wanted to tell you
the awesome story I wanted to share with
you the three A’s of Awesome and I
wanted to leave you with the closing
thought so let’s talk about those three
A’s
over the last few years I haven’t had
that much time to really think but
lately I have had the opportunity to
take a step back and ask myself you know
what is it over the last few years that
sort of helped me grow my website but
also grow myself and I’ve summarized
those things for me personally as three
A’s they are attitude awareness and
authenticity let me just talk about each
one briefly so attitude look we’re all
gonna get lumps and we’re all going to
get bumps none of us can predict the
future but we do know one thing about it
and that’s that it ain’t gonna go
according to plan we will all have high
highs and big days and proud moments of
smiles on graduation stages
father-daughter dances at weddings and
healthy babies screeching in the
delivery room but between those high
highs we may also have some lumps in
some bumps too it’s sad and you know
it’s it’s not pleasant to talk about but
you know your husband might leave you
your girlfriend could cheat your
headaches might be more serious than you
thought or your dog could get hit by a
car on the street it’s not a happy
thought but your kids could get mixed up
in gangs or bad scenes your mom could
get cancer your dad could get mean and
there are times in life when you will be
tossed down the well too with twists in
your stomach and with holes in your
heart and when that bad news washes over
you and when that paint sponges and
soaks in
I just really hope you feel like you’ve
always got two choices one you can swirl
and twirl in gloom and doom forever or
two you can grieve and then face the
future with newly sober eyes having a
great attitude is about choosing option
number two and choosing no matter how
difficult it is no matter what pain hits
you choosing to move forward and move on
and take baby steps into the future the
second day is awareness
I love hanging out with three-year-olds
I love the way that they see the world
because they’re seeing the world for the
first time I love the way that they can
stare at a bug crossing the sidewalk I
love the way that they’ll stare
slack-jawed at the first baseball game
with wide eyes and a mitt on their hand
soaking in the crack of the bat and the
crunch of the peanuts and the smell of
the hot dogs I love the way that looks
spent hours picking dandelions in the
backyard and putting them into a nice
centerpiece for Thanksgiving dinner I
love the way that they see the world
because they’re seeing the world for the
first time having a sense of awareness
is just about embracing your inner
three-year-old because you all used to
be three years old
that three old boy is still part of you
that three year old girl is still part
of you but they’re in there and being
aware it’s just about remembering that
you saw everything you’ve seen for the
first time once too so there was a time
when it was your first time ever hitting
a string of green lights on the way home
from work there was there was the first
time you walked by the open door of a
bakery and snow smelled the bakery air
or the first time you pulled a $20 bill
out of your old jacket pockets that
found money the last day is authenticity
and for this one I want to tell you a
quick story let’s go all the way back to
1932 when on a peanut farm in Georgia a
little baby boy named Roosevelt Grier
was born there is no career or rosey
Grier’s people used to call him grew up
and grew into 300 pounds 6 foot 5
linebacker in the NFL he’s number 76 in
the picture here he is pictured with the
fearsome foursome these are four guys in
the LA Rams from the 1960s you did not
want to go up against they were tough
football players doing what they love
which was you know crushing skulls and
separating shoulders on the football
field but rosey Grier also had another
passion in his deep deeply authentic
self he also loved needlepoint
he loved he looked knitting he said that
it calmed him down it relaxed him it
took away his fear of fly and helped him
meet chicks I mean he loved it so much
that after he retired from the NFL he
started joining clubs and he even put
out a book called rosey Grier’s
needlepoint for Men
a great cover he’s actually if he’d
notice he’s actually needle pointing his
own face and so what I love about this
story is that rosey Grier is just such
an authentic person and that’s what
authenticity is all about it’s just
about being you and being cool with that
and I think when you’re authentic you
end up following your heart and you put
yourself in places and situations and in
conversations that you love and that you
enjoy you meet people that you like
talking to you go places you’ve dreamt
about and you end up following your
heart and feeling very fulfilled so
those are the three A’s for the closing
thought I want to take you all the way
back to my parents coming to Canada no I
I don’t know what it would feel like
coming to a new country when you’re in
your mid-20s I don’t know because I
never did it but I would imagine that it
would take a great attitude I would
imagine that you’d have to be pretty
aware of your surroundings and
appreciating the small wonders that
you’re starting to see in your new world
and I think you’d have to be really
authentic you’d have to be really true
to yourself in order to get through what
you’re being exposed to I’d like to
pause my TED talk for about 10 seconds
right now because you don’t get many
opportunities in life to do something
like this and my parents are sitting in
the front row so I want to ask them to
if you don’t mind stand up and just I
want to say thank you to you guys
when I was growing out my dad uses love
telling the story of his first day in
Canada and it’s a great story because
what happened was he got off the plane
at the Toronto Airport and he was
welcomed by a non-profit group which I’m
sure someone in this room runs and and
this nonprofit group had a big welcoming
lunch for all the new immigrants to
Canada my dad says he got off he got off
the plane he went to this lunch and
there was this huge spread there was
bread there was those little mini dill
pickles
it was olives those little white onions
there was a rolled-up turkey cold cuts
rolled-up ham cold cuts rolled up roast
beef cold cuts and little cubes of
cheese there was tuna salad sandwiches
and egg salad sandwiches and salmon
salad sandwiches there was lasagna there
was casseroles
there was brownies there was butter
tarts and there was pies lots and lots
of pies and what my dad tells the story
he says the craziest thing was I’ve
never seen any of that before except
bread I don’t know what was meat always
vegetarian I was eating olives with pie
you know I just I just couldn’t believe
how many things you can get here when I
was when I was five years old my dad
used to take me grocery shopping and he
would stare and wonder at the little
stickers that are on the fruits and
vegetables he would say look can you
believe they have a mango here from
Mexico they’ve got an apple here from
South Africa can you believe they got a
date from Morocco
he’s like do you know where Morocco even
is
and I’d say I’m five I don’t even know
where I am
just ANP and he’d say I don’t know where
Morocco is either well let’s find out
and so we’d buy the day and we’d go home
and we’d actually take an atlas off the
shelf and we’d flip through until we
found this mysterious country and when
we did my dad would say can you believe
someone climbed a tree over there pick
this thing off it put it in the truck
drove it all the way to the docks and
then sailed it all the way across the
Atlantic Ocean and then put it in
another truck and drove that all the way
to a tiny grocery store just outside our
house so that they can sell it to us for
25 cents that’s I I don’t believe that
he’s like I don’t believe it either
things are amazing there’s just so many
things to be happy about when I stop to
think about it he’s absolutely right
there are so many things to be happy
about there we are you know the only
species on the only life-giving rock in
the entire universe that we’ve ever seen
capable of experiencing so many of these
things I mean we’re the only ones with
architecture and agriculture we’re the
only ones with jewelry and democracy
we’ve got airplanes highway lanes
interior design and horoscope signs
we’ve got fashion magazines house party
scenes you can watch a horror movie with
monsters you can go to a concert hears
guitars jamming we’ve got books buffets
and radio waves wedding brides and
rollercoaster rides you can sleep and
clean sheets you can get go to the
movies and get good seats you can smell
bakery air and walk around with rain
hair pop bubble wrap or taking a legal
map we got all that but we only got a
hundred years to enjoy it that’s the sad
part the cashiers at your grocery store
the foreman at your planet the guy
tailgating you home on the highway the
telemarketer calling you during dinner
every teacher you’ve ever had everyone
that’s ever woken up beside you every
politician in every country every actor
in every movie every single person in
your family everyone you love everyone
in this room and you will be dead in a
hundred years
life is so great that we only get such a
short time to experience and enjoy all
those tiny little moments that make it
so sweet and that that moment is right
now and those moments are counting down
and those moments are always always
always fleeting you will never be as
young as you are right now and that’s
why I believe that if you live your life
with a great attitude choosing to move
forward and move on whenever life deals
you a blow living with a sense of
awareness of the world around you
embracing your inner three-year-old and
seeing the tiny joys that make life so
sweet and being authentic to yourself
being you and being cool with that
letting your heart lead you and putting
yourself in experiences that satisfy you
but I think you live a life that is rich
and it’s satisfying and I think you live
a life that is truly awesome thank you