to see my TED talk today it’s very well
appreciated come out on a sunny day well
for this do name is Mitchell Holmes
today I’ll be talking about leadership
can affect local communities my title
obviously is break the chains on maths
the unknown but we’ll get to that later
in the presentation but let me define
you a word everyone in here knows a word
leadership well there’s several
definitions to the word leadership see
it’s such a broad word there’s several
definitions to it whether it be helping
at a school event where I’ll be leading
a sports team there’s there several
different types of leaders we don’t know
them all everyone does someone does but
we’re going to quickly define the word
leadership and it’s somebody who is able
to influence people’s decisions based on
people’s interests but the question I
have is what about the 47% that’s still
about half the kids in United States now
obviously we don’t know their situation
what’s going on but we can tell that
they’re not involved let me tell you a
story
so two-and-a-half years ago my dad came
up and he was like Mitch okay yeah dad
he goes there’s a youth leadership
organization out there called deem life
and I looked at him with some confused
blank stare because at the time I
thought Dean Willie was club for nerds
or something well tell me about some of
the stuff they do the amount of fun they
have and he got me interested and me
with my personality the way my mindset
is try it if you don’t like it you don’t
have to do it again so I went to one of
their meetings and I got to meet people
from Brentwood claritin Cranberry all
kids in the general Pittsburgh area that
were in this organization and there were
nice kids for the most part nice kids
and it was a place I know I could be
without being judged being harassed so I
joined that night about your a half
later membership in Crete decreases you
know a lot a lot of active members were
rarely doing events we did no
fundraisers throughout the time I joined
DeMolay and my chapter chairman comes up
to me he’s like Mitch I go yes he goes
we need you to become a master counselor
in case you don’t know what Master
counselor is it’s president of the
chapter of the top-ranking youth the
chapter
you know he’s responsible for setting up
the meetings planning events doing
fundraisers setting up a whole term
basically for the chapter and when he
looked at me and he told me that I was
very shocked considering I had no
leadership experience whatsoever and he
wanted me to take such a high ranking
position when I didn’t know too much
about Dean line once again my
personality kicked in and I said sure
I’ll do it
you know because I always like to take
an opportunity if I don’t like it like I
said I don’t have to do it again so I
took the opportunity and I got installed
as master counselor in November
since then we’ve increased by 50%
membership plus the 12 active Dee
malaise at this point and as well as at
we’re planning events planning
fundraisers and for good cause for the
children’s dyslexia centers and for the
chapter for function for us to do events
we did our first airsoft event in the
past three years that’s that’s awesome
but you see the fun part is I was the
47% I was included in that 47% you know
and once I started getting involved in
things I didn’t know what I was going to
be or what I was going to do but I found
my true leadership potential I never
thought in the world I’d be a leader but
I was able to change people’s lives by
having them join the organization and
fundraise for good cause that’s just
amazing you know and every time I think
about it I’m always thankful for what
I’ve done and thankful for whatever I
get in life but the fact that I was in
that 47% and I did not know what I was
doing and I somehow got there and I
found my true leadership potential I
realized who I was because I got
involved that’s like that for everything
you have to get involved to find out who
you are so for the 47% you know we don’t
know your situation we don’t know what’s
going on but try to get involved with
something to find out who you are that
will judge and once you are in the
future and you’ll learn about yourself
things you never thought you learned
about or things you thought you never
had
you’ll learn by getting involved
you don’t have to fundraise for cancer
you don’t have to fundraise for dyslexia
you can even fundraise for like a
memorial at your local park the
imaginable is very imaginable you could
do it it doesn’t matter what it is or
what it’s from always strive to do
action benefit your community there’s
always room for improvement thank you
all for listening my TED talk and have a good rest ernight thank you