with stories stories of mighty kings and
queens adventurers sailors astronauts
exploring the unknowns of the universe
and in each of these stories we learn
lessons we learn lessons about the
importance of right versus wrong good
versus evil success force failure and we
also learned the importance in the
aspiration the amazing nature when it
comes with making great discoveries in
our lives as well when you think about
it with a hundred billion planets in our
galaxy 95 percent of the ocean
unexplored and technology constantly
proving every day to open unlimited
boundaries for what we can innovate in
our future it’s really quite
extraordinary lies will add value to
make an impact to our planet to our
world for some it might be discovering
the next multi-million dollar app for
others maybe it’s becoming the first man
or woman on Mars after a Matt Damon of
course but as I grew older and I listen
to these stories and I think and I would
see them all merging together I start to
begin to wonder well what about what
about my story you know what about our
story what is it that’s gonna make us
successful what is our purpose in life
as I began to think about these
questions I realized how important they
work is when we were younger we didn’t
really ask ourselves these types of
questions but it wasn’t really that
significant you’re in middle school of
high school it’s not something you’re
thinking about you think about okay I’m
gonna become some type of job I may
become an astronaut a police officer may
become a firefighter but then as you get
older people you start constantly ask
those questions tell me about yourself
what do you want to do with your life
what type of man or woman do you want to
become and we don’t think about these
things as we grew up and so they’re
really perplexing me that astonished me
and so the reason I asked and I wonder
why this is it because I realized we as
human beings from a young nation we
don’t plan far ahead in the future we
don’t plan Edward Jones conduct a study
that said that we spend more time
planning for a next vacation than we do
planning for retirement in fact Zig Zig
Zig Ziglar found that we spend more time
planning for a next vacation than our
entire life I mean in that case when we
think about that I wouldn’t be surprised
if we actually spend more time watching
cat videos and we actually do
specificity
time but seriously if you think about
that we really don’t because we’re not
raised to think about these challenging
questions we’re not raised to learn the
skill sets that are necessary for
setting short-term and long-term goals
because we’re focused on our academics
we’re focused on figuring out maybe at a
young age who we are but not thinking
about the long term in the long run so
the question is whose responsibility is
this is it education
well education is responsibility is to
teach us the basic principle is a math
of Sciences of English of how to work in
teams and interact so the next question
is is it our parents or our parents
responsibility is to teach us how to
grow to love us and nurture us to
support us in becoming our own man or
woman someday so that we can in return
give that back to our children so who
doesn’t really come down to whose
responsibility is it well it’s ours it’s
yours it’s mine it’s our responsibility
of taking an account asking these hard
questions of what is my story when I
look 20 years from now 30 years from now
40 years from now what type of man and
woman I am what am I going to say about
my own characteristics of who I am and
so I want to step back for a second I
want to ask you I want to challenge you
I want you to take a moment to think
back to when you were a kid I want you
to envision the house you grew up in I
want you to envision what you ate what
you played with the toys you play with
the people that you played with and I
want you to ask yourself I want you to
remember I want you to tell me what did
you want to be when you grew up
was it an astronaut a police officer a
firefighter a dancer an artist well if
you’re like me you want to be a doctor
more than anything in the world ever
since I was a little kid I wanted
nothing more than to be a doctor you
know I wanted I wanted to save lives I
wanted to help people I wanted to change
people’s lives I wanted people to know
that when they came to my hospital they
were going to go home alive that next
day and I did everything that society
asked me to do I got top grades in high
school I went to UCLA I went to USC I
got a master’s in medicine I got I took
the MCAT I applied to medical school but
it wasn’t until I went to medical school
it wasn’t till I applied in medical
school that this I made the single most
important discovery I’ve ever made in my
entire life
and it was just one question is one
question on the medical school
application I’d never really seriously
considered and that was this why why why
do you want to go to
school it seems crazy right like guys
are growing up you you actually you’re
asked us up at all you so you wanna go
why do you wanna go but I would just say
oh I want to save lives I want to help
people I want to do the things that I
just share with you but deep down really
like in my human heart Who I am as an
individual why did I actually want to go
to med school because those things
saving life so that that’s what
everybody else was writing about in
their application that’s absolutely what
everybody else was writing listen what
made me unique as a human being it
wasn’t made me unique as an individual I
would guarantee that I would be
successful someday and so I had to take
a step back I had to either reflect for
a moment decide is this really who I was
and what I was meant to do because if I
can’t answer this question if I can
answer this question applied in medical
school how can I be assured that the med
school should choose me as well and so I
stepped back and I took a moment to
reflect on the hard questions of who am
i what am i great at what type of man or
woman do I want to become later in life
and it’s kind of crazy because at that
age you don’t really think about these
things growing up right like in high
school middle school the last thing I
was singing about was the east side of
the questions cuz I was worried what
type of grades am I gonna get you know
what I’m gonna get done with class so I
can go surfers so I can go play
volleyball down at the beach I just
didn’t care about these things it wasn’t
important at the time but then time
passes it gets older and older and I
like to believe that we were really
young and high school sure but we’re
also really mature we’re growing and I
wish I’d ask myself these questions
the other reason anything about us cuz
well all my other friends were heating
Howdy’s and BMWs I was driving around a
creeper ban on my parents gave me and
it’s like it’s like driving a washing
machine around campus you know you’re
always wandering with people if they if
I out that I’m gonna pick up a girl for
a first day what her parents gonna think
what I Drive up those are the things I
worry about in high school is that it
you don’t think about these big like
purpose questions at all but I know I’m
not alone at all I know I’m not alone
because Penn State did a study that
found that 80% of their incoming
freshmen for college had no idea what
major they want to do or uncertain about
whatever career they have in fact 50% of
them ended up realizing that when they
did pick a major they ended up changing
major at least one or two more times you
know to me that says that we actually
don’t know when we’re going to college
what we really want to do
their lives and I understand that
because college is meant to be an
exploratory period college is meant to
be that experience where you go to
college it’s it’s kind of like that old
common tradition where you ship your kid
off into the woods to go hunt the bear
and they come back and become a man or a
woman right it’s that idea that you go
to learn to discover yourself but the
challenges now is that it’s harder to
get into college it’s more expensive
that debt coming out of college is
greater so the pressures of going to
college are higher and so my question
has always been what happens if you
create or implement program so what
happens if you prepare children whether
in middle school or high school at a
young age to think more critically about
some of the questions that when were 20
30 40 50 we start to think about what
would happen if someone went to college
doing exactly what they wanted to do and
in return they study classic because
they knew they want to because it would
bare them and make them more successful
in fact 60% of students surveyed by the
JED foundation found that sorry 60% of
students surveyed were mostly unprepared
for college so compared to what were the
greatest troubles like finances or
social pressures it’s just the idea of
like self the idea of being emotionally
prepared being comfortable with yourself
and who you are and what is your story
was one of the greatest concerns and so
these things that challenged me I vies
wondered so for the last four to five
years I’ve been asking these questions
what makes someone successful or is this
someone who is not what is it that
contributes to make sure someone lives a
joyous life versus someone who does not
and so I’ve been asking some the most
influential thought leader celebrities
and decision makers that you think of
from mayors of large cities to celebrity
X Y & Z these types of questions one the
most profound most profound responses I
got came from Jack and Suzy Welch so
Jack Welch is the same CEO of General
Electric who’s also famed by Time
magazine as the manager of the century
so not your century and Suzy is a famed
author TV personality and journalist and
I asked him I said I want you to go back
to when you’re 18 you’re 20 to 25 years
old and if you could give yourself one
piece of advice that would make you more
successful in a tree you lived a more
joyous life from the one you live today
what would that be
and what they said was so astonishing
they didn’t even hesitate was like what
the flash of an eye they immediately
said this discover what
you’re great at discover what you’re
passionate about merge the two together
and you will never work a day in your
life so I’m gonna say that again because
if there’s one thing you take away I
think it’s this discover what you’re
great at discover what you’re passionate
about where it’s your two together and
you will never work a day in your life
and to be honest at first when I heard
that I didn’t think anything I was
actually really upset because it was too
fluffy it was too philosophical it
didn’t seem practical in me and I wanted
to know well I want to walk out there
with a bag of cash I wanted a quick fix
I want to make a million dollars in a
week or two weeks later but that’s not
where you get because we don’t get quick
fixes we want them but that’s when I
realized that I had to go through this
process I stepped out of the medical
application process and this is where
I’m going to give you three kind of what
my secrets to self-discovery we’re after
this to let me know where I am today and
the first one is this is that I had to
slow down I had a step back and I had a
reflect on who I was and what I really
wanted to do what was I grayed out what
was i passionate about because if I did
those things maybe life would be a
little bit easier and what I realized is
that we kind of all live in what I call
the fish tank a fish tank is it’s our
routine it’s kind of the people we see
every day is the work we do it’s all the
things that we do on a common basis that
we get comfortable with and what happens
is you’re inside this little fish tank
and you’re soakin find it all the time
that you don’t realize what are the
changes that you need to make to grow
how do you step outside of their comfort
zone so the first thing after that you
realize is that you’ve got to kind of
tweak your way outside of the tank and
probably much more cleaner and sexier
way than I just did there but you guys
step outside of that fish tank step
outside of that comfort zone because
when you do you might look back at the
fish tank and realize wow the water and
that fish thing is a lot more dirty and
polluted than I thought it was you know
that fish stinks a lot nicer you clean
over there maybe I should try to check
that and see how that would fit for me
and so that’s the first thing as to slow
down and the second one is to explore
what I mean by explore I don’t mean just
picking up a book reading and going to
class which is great trust me I have had
the best education I would never trade a
moment of the education that I’ve had so
I’m not talking about education right
now I’m talking about his experience a
learning an example would that would be
right now I imagine there are many of
the many of the production team here
today the
students who are interested in our
introduced interested in production and
so you guys get this unique exposure and
experience with this program to put this
on to learn is this something hands-on
that you really enjoy doing it’s really
neat to see that because that hands-on
experience is what teaches you is this a
skill I like in something I enjoy and so
that leads us the first kind of
subcategory of under explore is to learn
how to be Purpose Driven so what I mean
by Purpose Driven so growing up I always
wanted to be a doctor that’s what we
call the what what I wanted to be was a
doctor who I wanted these I want to be
someone who gave back to society whose
help save lives who solved major
problems who’s compassionate like to
work in teams that’s the who I wanted to
be that’s like on a character level but
why I wanted to be a doctor I didn’t
really know that why the underlying
purpose and so an example Illustrated
that is Megan McConnell maybe McConnell
is a student at UCLA she’s a medical
student currently there and at a young
age her younger sister suffered at
Romero my injuries her head and if the
paramedics in the physicians hadn’t seen
her in time she likely would not be here
today and ever since that moment Megan’s
always wanted to know why did this
happen medically what was going on you
know what can I do and sure that is this
happens to somebody else’s little sister
that I can be that position that helps
save law I can be that paramedic that
helps save lives
she always had these questions that
underline why that was the purpose
that’s what that was what was driving
her and so she knew that was her why she
wanted to understand these questions who
she want to become she had figured out
in the nature of her morals and values
but when it came to the what she wanted
to do so I decided what I want to do
first before you know that when it came
to her what she considered a lot of
different career opportunities most of
them were in medicine but like piei
medicine becoming a doctor etc and she
was able to narrow it down finally
becoming a physician and as persisted
through is now a medical student on one
of the top universities in the country
that’s by example what it means to be
Purpose Driven identify really big
challenges in life that you want to
achieve and you know help provide food
to those in hungry help provide water
those in need of sanitary water the
second is to step outside of your
comfort zone and take risks so this is
going back to the idea of the fish
is we don’t learn we don’t grow unless
we challenge ourselves and so any
example that as any carnie any carnie
lived in Minnesota and she was very much
responsible at a very early age for
taking care of her family when most
young girls should not be in that
position and so as a as a matter of fact
of that as a result she ended up not
really getting discovered for personal
self early on in life it wasn’t until
later after she graduated college and
started working she realized that she
needed for who she really was she had no
idea she had no idea what she really
wanted to do in life at that time and so
she left Minnesota and moved across the
country to California
and she served this whole new life she
stepped outside that comfort zone she
was starting to make new friends and
everything the idea that extreme nature
of stepping outside of your comfort zone
as ovo of a world of opportunities now
where she was executive director of a
major nonprofit at a really young age of
25 and now she’s also a manager had
manager at a major non-profit doing
something that she’s really passionate
about and loves so that said yes
stepping outside of that comfort zone
that’s Annie and then the three is
called doing passion projects so what’s
a passion project well passion project
might be an example of this production
team here there are hands on things that
you can do because you are interested in
them maybe it’s you want you’re
interested in tech you wanna learn how
to make a computer from scratch maybe
it’s you’re interested in becoming a
doctor so you volunteer in a hospital
cleaning bedsheets interacting with
patients those types of things
little short projects that help give you
exposure to a lot of different either
career fields or – this is outside of
careers this can be the type of person
you want to be morals volunteering in
the community whatever it is to find out
what are the things that you enjoy
because we don’t learn by doing I mean
I’m sorry take that back we learn more
by doing that we do by learning well I
mean that we learn more about doing than
we do by learning
it’s that context of I can go read a
book and I can understand somebody
else’s perspective and experience but
until I go do it myself
I don’t really learn if I’m great at
around passionate about it going back to
what Jack and Susie well said an example
that is Corey Brandt Corey Brown went to
UCLA in 2008 he you thought you wanted
study political science four years later
you graduates he still doesn’t really
know what he wants to do so he decides
okay I’m going to work on the
presidential campaigns I think that’s
something I’m interested four years
later at college so he goes and he works
on the presidential campaign in 2012 and
he is it responsible for 90
days working 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. for
organizing the community and getting
them to vote to getting them to get
excited and go into the office polls and
vote and from that experience he learned
he loves working in teams before that he
was always an individual he loves
working in teams
he loves organizing a community and he
now knows for certain that he’s going to
pursue a career in politics either as a
congressman or even as far as you can
possibly go which is his goal right now
so that would so that was one slow down
into is Explorer 3 is just commit once
you’ve gone through this period it takes
a long time this doesn’t happen
overnight this takes one year two years
four years five years to have this
exploratory experience then what you got
to do is you got to commit to some type
of identity that you want to do because
if you don’t you get trapped in what’s
called the Peter Pan principle the Peter
crane principle says exactly what it is
that if you don’t commit to a certain
identity you stay young forever
you’re constantly searching constantly
learning trapped on your Island it’s a
little wild berries philosophical yes
very kind of touchy-feely but it’s true
it happens to a lot of people that’s why
a lot of people change careers four or
five six times and so I challenge you it
takes a certain type of person to go
through the experience that I have but
I’m excited because many years later now
I know because I stick back from that
medical school application process and I
went towards what am i great at well I
know I’m great at the fields of
creativity innovation I know I’m great
at solving problems I know I’m great I
get in front of people and I enjoy
speaking to and not I don’t know what
I’m Nestle great at that but I enjoy
that something I’m passionate about
I’m passionate about other things too
innovating the future in healthcare
there’s something I’m very passionate
about
I’m innovative about am fascinated about
being involved in teams so I’ve learned
a lot and it’s been a hard process it’s
not easy but once you go through this
process you look back to three years
later it’s really takes off quite a bit
of a relief off your shoulders so that’s
what I like to leave with today it’s
been an honor to be how this experience
this opportunity to be able to share it
and so as I look back and I look back on
what is my purpose what do I want to do
in life I challenge you to ask you what is your story thank you