[0:00]The wisest person I ever met in my life, a third grade dropout. Wisest and dropout in the same sentence is rather oxymoronic, like jumbo shrimp.
[0:16]Like fun run, ain't nothing fun about it. Like Microsoft Works, y'all don't hear me? I used to say like country music, but I've lived in Texas so long, I, I love country music now. I hunt, I fish, I have cowboy boots and cowboy.Y'all, I'm a blackneck redneck.Do you hear what I'm saying to you? No longer oxymoronic for me to say country music. And it's not oxymoronic for me to say third grade and dropout. That third grade dropout, the wisest person I ever met in my life who taught me to combine knowledge and wisdom to make an impact, was my father. A simple cook. Wisest man ever met in my life, just a simple cook. Left school in the third grade to help out on the family farm, but just because he left school doesn't mean his education stopped. Mark Twain once said, I've never allowed my schooling to get in the way of my education. My father taught himself how to read, taught himself how to write, decided in the midst of Jim Crowism as America was breathing the last gas for the Civil War. My father decided he was going to stand and be a man. Not a black man, not a brown man, not a white man, but a man. He literally challenged himself to be the best that he could all the days of his life. I have four degrees, my brother is a judge. We're not the smartest ones in our family. A third grade dropout daddy, a third grade dropout daddy who was quoting Michelangelo, saying to us, boys, I won't have a problem if you aim high and miss, but I'm going to have a real issue if you aim low and hit. A country mother quoting Henry Ford, saying if you think you can, or if you think you can't, you're right. I learned that from a third grade drop.Simple lessons, lessons like these. Son, you'd rather be an hour early than a minute late. We never knew what time it was in my house because the clocks were always ahead. My mother said for nearly 30 years, my father left the house at 3:45 in the morning. One day she asked him, why, daddy? He said, maybe one of my boys will catch me in the act of excellence. I want to share two things with you. Aristotle said, you are what you repeatedly do, therefore excellence ought to be a habit, not an act. Don't ever forget that. I know you're tough, but always remember to be kind. Always, don't ever forget that. Never embarrass mama. Mhm. Yeah. If mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.If daddy ain't happy, don't nobody care, but you know, I'm going to tell you. Next lesson. Lesson from a cook over there in the galley. Son, make sure your servant's towel is bigger than your ego. Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity. You all might have a relative in mind you want to send that to, let me say it again. Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity.Pride is the burden of a foolish person. John Wooden coached basketball at UCLA for a living, but his calling was to impact people. And with all those national championships, guess what he was found doing in the middle of the week? Going into the cupboard, grabbing a broom and sweeping his own gym floor. You want to make an impact, find your broom. Every day of your life, you find your broom. You grow your influence that way. That way you're attracting people so that you can impact them. Final lesson. Son. If you're going to do a job, do it right. I've always been told. How average I can be. Always been criticized about being average. But I want to tell you something. I stand here before you, before all of these people, not listening to those words. But telling myself every single day to shoot for the stars to be the best that I can be. Good enough isn't good enough if it can be better. And better isn't good enough if it can be best. Let me close with a very personal story that I think will bring all this into focus. Wisdom will come to you in the unlikeliest of sources. A lot of times through failure. When you hit rock bottom, remember this, while you're struggling, rock bottom can also be a great foundation on which to build. And on which to grow. I'm not worried that you'll be successful. I'm worried that you won't fail from time to time. The person that gets up off the canvas and keeps growing, that's the person that will continue to grow their influence. Back in the seventies to help me make this point. Let me introduce you to someone. I'm at the finest woman I'd ever met in my life. Mhm. Back in my day we had to call her a brick. House. This woman was the finest woman I'd ever seen in my life.There's just one little problem. Back then ladies didn't like big old linemen.The blind side hadn't come out yet. They, they like quarterbacks and running backs.We're at this dance and I find out her name is Trina Williams from Lompoc, California. And we, we're all dancing and we're, we're just, just excited and I decide in the middle of dancing with her that I would ask her for a phone number. Trina was the first one.Trina was the only woman in college who gave me her real telephone number. The next day we walked to Baskin and Robbins ice cream parlor. My friends couldn't believe it. This has been 40 years ago and my friends still can't believe it. We go on a second date. And a third date. And a fourth date. Mhm. We drive from Chico to Vallejo so that she could meet my parents. My father meets her. My daddy, my hero, he meets her, pulls me to the side and says, is she psycho? But anyway, we go together for a year, two years, three years, four years. By now Trina's a senior in college. I'm still a freshman, but I'm working some things out. I'm so glad I graduated in four terms, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan. So now it's, it's, it's time to propose, so I talk to her girlfriends and it's California, it's in the seventies, so it has to be outside, have to have a candle and you have to have, you know, some chocolate. Listen, I'm from the hood. I had a bottle of Boon's Farm wine.That's what I had. She said yes. That was the key. I married the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen in my life. Y'all ever been to a wedding and even before the wedding starts, you hear this. How in the world? And it was coming from my side of the family. We get married, we have a few children, our lives are great. One day Trina finds a lump in her left breast. Breast cancer. Six years after that diagnosis, me and my two little boys walked up to mommy's casket. And for two years, my heart didn't beat. It wasn't for my faith in God, I, I wouldn't be standing here today. If it wasn't for those two little boys, there'd have been no reason for which to go on. I was completely lost.
[7:46]That was rock bottom. You know what sustained me? The wisdom of a third grade dropout. The wisdom of a simple cook. We're at the casket. I'd never seen my dad cry. But this time I saw my dad cry.That was his daughter.Trina was his daughter, not his daughter-in-law. And I'm right behind my father about to see her for the last time on this Earth. And my father shared three words with me that changed my life right there at the casket. It would be the last lesson he would ever teach me. He said, son, just stand. You keep standing. You keep standing no matter how rough the sea, you keep standing and I'm not talking about just water. You keep standing. No matter what, you don't give up. And as clearly as I'm talking to you today, these were some of her last words to me. She looked me in the eye and she said, it doesn't matter to me any longer how long I live. What matters to me most is how I live. Here's y'all one question, a question that I was asked all my life by a third grade dropout. How you living? How you living? Every day ask yourself that question, how you living? Here's, here's what a cook would suggest. You to live this way, that you would not judge. That you would show up early, that you'd be kind, that you'd make sure that that servant's towel is huge and used. That if you're going to do something, you do it the right way. That that that cook would tell you this, that it's never wrong to do the right thing. That how you do anything is how you do everything. And in that way you will grow your influence to make an impact. In that way you will honor all those who have gone before you, who have invested in you. Look in those unlikeliest places for wisdom. Enhance your life every day. By seeking that wisdom and asking yourself every night, how am I living? May God richly bless y'all.Thank you for being here. Make an impact.
