okay so does anybody here have two
different sized feet okay good okay sort
of I don’t know because I like 30% of
the population by the way have two
different sized feet and there’s no
clinical name for this so I have made up
my own it’s called a miss foot or a
misfit or even a misfit so also a
complete exercise thematic and the
combination of these two things can be
kind of a problem because when I’m
picking exercise shoes I have to pick a
vacatur into my big foot and the little
foot so this is one time I can miniskirt
up I go to this hipster sneaker store in
Hollywood that doesn’t accept returns
and I cater to my big foot and so oh my
go to my hip hop dance class I’m like
gonna kill it poppin off but instead of
popping or locking I am tripping in
shoes they’re literally clown sized on
me so it just so happened that I was
going out to skid row to feed the
homeless that night and I thought why
don’t I bring these overpriced to make
sneakers down to skid row and give them
to somebody who could use them a lot
more than I can so now that I go to skid
row and even feel like this excellent
person and I immediately spot this like
ideal sneaker recipient which is to say
a guy who looked like he could use kind
of a new pair of anything so I hand him
the sneakers ready for his gratitude and
suddenly he looks at me he looks at the
sneakers he looks back at me and he’s
like honey you don’t have another color
so he said so I go home really
discouraged about humanity you know here
I know trying to get back and this guy
who could clearly use my gift is
sniffing at it so the more I thought
about it the more I wondered why did I
feel like I needed to be
it’s a good person for what I’ve done
and that got me thinking about labels
see we have all worn a lot of labels in
our life we are all wearing labels on
our clothing I’ve worn the label of
women I were the label of young now I
feel like I wear the old ermine
maybe you’ve worn the label of student
or divorced or sexual abuse victim
whatever it is and we foreign selling
labels like I’ve learned the label of
cat lady it’s true one of my books is
about my relationship with my cats and
on the Internet Movie Database IMDB
where it lists like your credits for TV
and film it has this trivia thing and
like the trivia is always really
interesting it’s like was a distant
relative of Charlie Chaplin or has
climbed Machu Picchu
my 1 bit of trivia has a cat but the
most importantly blackboard is a little
less benign than cat lady see the most
important label I Lauren is act and I
have a brace that label wholeheartedly
now everybody has a different definition
of Attucks so I am going to give you
mine it’s somebody who is so
uncomfortable with how they feel that
they’re willing to do anything they can
to change it even if changing it in a
dial now you may wonder why would I
embrace the label that everybody knows
is back and I get it before I embrace
the late
I was horrified when people label me as
Wonder they did and addict I thought was
the person clutching the empty bottle in
the gutter or you know that their arm or
maybe somebody like the guy I give in my
shoes to it wasn’t the girl from the
next family went to the good college but
just happening to spend her 20s holed up
by herself doing cocaine of course
because I was holed up by myself doing
cocaine I knew there was something wrong
with me you know I thought I had to be
made me like not fit for this world or
you know a freak destined to spend their
life alone and I realized once the pain
of how I was living got to be greater
than the pain of changing that there was
something wrong with me I was an addict
I still AM I’m just one who hasn’t had a
drink or a drug in over 17 years okay
[Music]
but back to Skid Row
when I think about the experience now I
realized I was so consumed by my own
disappointment over this man’s failure
to appreciate my gift that I failed to
see my own prejudice you know I saw a
man with an invisible label that said
homeless he saw a pair of shoes he
didn’t like to me he was someone who
should be so grateful to someone like me
for caring to him he was a man with his
own hopes and dreams his own tasted
sneakers
a man who would probably fallen on hard
times and he surely saw me with a label
of his own not excellent person or
whatever it was I wanted to but who
knows you know do better trying to feel
better I really don’t know but the
problem as I see it is not that we label
people it’s that we do it in this
closed-minded way if we could use a
label as a jumping-off point and not a
conclusion I think it could be one of
our greatest tools for open-mindedness
consider this when students are labeled
smart or motivated studies show it
changes the rest of their lives but
that’s not the only good that labels two
labels that give us tribe because they
give us a group of like-minded
individuals that we can be a part of
whether that is dead heads or burners or
Dodgers fans or Lakers fans or writers
or students or addicts and labels change
our perception of labels change if you
don’t believe me consider this when I
was growing up the worst language you
could have was nerd today they are God
to walk among us you know mutt up in
Hollywood so people interact with
celebrities I could care less if someone
sends me a picture of them of the
celebrity my friend who sent me a selfie
he took with Mark Zuckerberg I almost
lost my mind and it’s like not just Mark
Zuckerberg it’s Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk
and like you know they are a-rod’s
today a nerd isn’t the only label that’s
changed think about eighty attention
deficit disorder now not that long ago
if you had that you were real screwed up
that’s with that baby met today Ted
Turner and Richard Branson are talking
about having it and dyslexia when I was
growing up we’re just you know just do
it if you were dyslexic that’s what that
meant
cut to now
and if I’m going to continue to
subscribe to that label as meaning
stupid I’m gonna have to reconcile that
with the fact that Steven Spielberg and
John Irving are among the people who are
dyslexic and how do I know that because
they have talked about it publicly in
turn giving other people who may be
suffering and shame with that label
permission to do the same now I noticed
something when I embraced the label an
addict sober addicts are some of the
smartest coolest most charming most
motivated most successful people I’ve
ever met in my life it was no lunar I
realized that these entertainers I loved
whether it was John or Russell Brand or
Stephen King the rare that they were
sober addicts and it was no wonder I
realized that the people who made me
want to be a writer
people like Fitzgerald and Tennessee
Williams had struggled with alcoholism
now before I erased the label of addict
I didn’t see myself as smart or
interesting or charming or motivated or
successful but as soon as I embrace the
label I started to notice those
commonalities among all the sober
addicts I was meeting I started to think
well maybe that’s me too now we all have
labels where is shame death and I’ll
tell you when I was struggling with the
label about it it got bad it ended up in
a night over 17 years ago drunk I was
driving and I thought I could just end
it all by swerving into oncoming traffic
attendant and I could regale you with
many tales of my CD adventures and
misdeeds but honestly they’re not that
interesting what’s interesting is I wear
the labels squarely on my chest now in
turn giving other people permission to
do the same like I said we all have
labels were ashamed
and that means we can all be part of a
revolution yes
but simply embracing the labels you are
most ashamed of you can be part of a
revolution as Leonard Cohen said there’s
a crack in everything that’s where the
light comes in so if you don’t know
where to start how about the label you
are I am a guy gave my shoes to his
human or what about the one I started
off with misfit I don’t know what
anybody who hasn’t for it at least a
split second felt like one of those so
that is my message to you go out there
fellow misfits embrace your labels share
them with your loved ones if you’re
comfortable share them with everyone
change the world thank you [Music]
different sized feet okay good okay sort
of I don’t know because I like 30% of
the population by the way have two
different sized feet and there’s no
clinical name for this so I have made up
my own it’s called a miss foot or a
misfit or even a misfit so also a
complete exercise thematic and the
combination of these two things can be
kind of a problem because when I’m
picking exercise shoes I have to pick a
vacatur into my big foot and the little
foot so this is one time I can miniskirt
up I go to this hipster sneaker store in
Hollywood that doesn’t accept returns
and I cater to my big foot and so oh my
go to my hip hop dance class I’m like
gonna kill it poppin off but instead of
popping or locking I am tripping in
shoes they’re literally clown sized on
me so it just so happened that I was
going out to skid row to feed the
homeless that night and I thought why
don’t I bring these overpriced to make
sneakers down to skid row and give them
to somebody who could use them a lot
more than I can so now that I go to skid
row and even feel like this excellent
person and I immediately spot this like
ideal sneaker recipient which is to say
a guy who looked like he could use kind
of a new pair of anything so I hand him
the sneakers ready for his gratitude and
suddenly he looks at me he looks at the
sneakers he looks back at me and he’s
like honey you don’t have another color
so he said so I go home really
discouraged about humanity you know here
I know trying to get back and this guy
who could clearly use my gift is
sniffing at it so the more I thought
about it the more I wondered why did I
feel like I needed to be
it’s a good person for what I’ve done
and that got me thinking about labels
see we have all worn a lot of labels in
our life we are all wearing labels on
our clothing I’ve worn the label of
women I were the label of young now I
feel like I wear the old ermine
maybe you’ve worn the label of student
or divorced or sexual abuse victim
whatever it is and we foreign selling
labels like I’ve learned the label of
cat lady it’s true one of my books is
about my relationship with my cats and
on the Internet Movie Database IMDB
where it lists like your credits for TV
and film it has this trivia thing and
like the trivia is always really
interesting it’s like was a distant
relative of Charlie Chaplin or has
climbed Machu Picchu
my 1 bit of trivia has a cat but the
most importantly blackboard is a little
less benign than cat lady see the most
important label I Lauren is act and I
have a brace that label wholeheartedly
now everybody has a different definition
of Attucks so I am going to give you
mine it’s somebody who is so
uncomfortable with how they feel that
they’re willing to do anything they can
to change it even if changing it in a
dial now you may wonder why would I
embrace the label that everybody knows
is back and I get it before I embrace
the late
I was horrified when people label me as
Wonder they did and addict I thought was
the person clutching the empty bottle in
the gutter or you know that their arm or
maybe somebody like the guy I give in my
shoes to it wasn’t the girl from the
next family went to the good college but
just happening to spend her 20s holed up
by herself doing cocaine of course
because I was holed up by myself doing
cocaine I knew there was something wrong
with me you know I thought I had to be
made me like not fit for this world or
you know a freak destined to spend their
life alone and I realized once the pain
of how I was living got to be greater
than the pain of changing that there was
something wrong with me I was an addict
I still AM I’m just one who hasn’t had a
drink or a drug in over 17 years okay
[Music]
but back to Skid Row
when I think about the experience now I
realized I was so consumed by my own
disappointment over this man’s failure
to appreciate my gift that I failed to
see my own prejudice you know I saw a
man with an invisible label that said
homeless he saw a pair of shoes he
didn’t like to me he was someone who
should be so grateful to someone like me
for caring to him he was a man with his
own hopes and dreams his own tasted
sneakers
a man who would probably fallen on hard
times and he surely saw me with a label
of his own not excellent person or
whatever it was I wanted to but who
knows you know do better trying to feel
better I really don’t know but the
problem as I see it is not that we label
people it’s that we do it in this
closed-minded way if we could use a
label as a jumping-off point and not a
conclusion I think it could be one of
our greatest tools for open-mindedness
consider this when students are labeled
smart or motivated studies show it
changes the rest of their lives but
that’s not the only good that labels two
labels that give us tribe because they
give us a group of like-minded
individuals that we can be a part of
whether that is dead heads or burners or
Dodgers fans or Lakers fans or writers
or students or addicts and labels change
our perception of labels change if you
don’t believe me consider this when I
was growing up the worst language you
could have was nerd today they are God
to walk among us you know mutt up in
Hollywood so people interact with
celebrities I could care less if someone
sends me a picture of them of the
celebrity my friend who sent me a selfie
he took with Mark Zuckerberg I almost
lost my mind and it’s like not just Mark
Zuckerberg it’s Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk
and like you know they are a-rod’s
today a nerd isn’t the only label that’s
changed think about eighty attention
deficit disorder now not that long ago
if you had that you were real screwed up
that’s with that baby met today Ted
Turner and Richard Branson are talking
about having it and dyslexia when I was
growing up we’re just you know just do
it if you were dyslexic that’s what that
meant
cut to now
and if I’m going to continue to
subscribe to that label as meaning
stupid I’m gonna have to reconcile that
with the fact that Steven Spielberg and
John Irving are among the people who are
dyslexic and how do I know that because
they have talked about it publicly in
turn giving other people who may be
suffering and shame with that label
permission to do the same now I noticed
something when I embraced the label an
addict sober addicts are some of the
smartest coolest most charming most
motivated most successful people I’ve
ever met in my life it was no lunar I
realized that these entertainers I loved
whether it was John or Russell Brand or
Stephen King the rare that they were
sober addicts and it was no wonder I
realized that the people who made me
want to be a writer
people like Fitzgerald and Tennessee
Williams had struggled with alcoholism
now before I erased the label of addict
I didn’t see myself as smart or
interesting or charming or motivated or
successful but as soon as I embrace the
label I started to notice those
commonalities among all the sober
addicts I was meeting I started to think
well maybe that’s me too now we all have
labels where is shame death and I’ll
tell you when I was struggling with the
label about it it got bad it ended up in
a night over 17 years ago drunk I was
driving and I thought I could just end
it all by swerving into oncoming traffic
attendant and I could regale you with
many tales of my CD adventures and
misdeeds but honestly they’re not that
interesting what’s interesting is I wear
the labels squarely on my chest now in
turn giving other people permission to
do the same like I said we all have
labels were ashamed
and that means we can all be part of a
revolution yes
but simply embracing the labels you are
most ashamed of you can be part of a
revolution as Leonard Cohen said there’s
a crack in everything that’s where the
light comes in so if you don’t know
where to start how about the label you
are I am a guy gave my shoes to his
human or what about the one I started
off with misfit I don’t know what
anybody who hasn’t for it at least a
split second felt like one of those so
that is my message to you go out there
fellow misfits embrace your labels share
them with your loved ones if you’re
comfortable share them with everyone
change the world thank you [Music]
Please follow and like us: