A short persuasive monologue arguing that entrepreneurship, the profit motive, and individual self-interest are primary drivers of large-scale positive change. The speaker (Ryan Daniel Moran) contrasts traditional selflessness with market-driven innovation, credits entrepreneurs (e.g., Elon Musk, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos) with solving major problems like climate change and poverty, and urges listeners to pursue entrepreneurship to create value and impact.
When I was a kid, I was told that I could change the world. I might even say that I should change the world, at least change my world. And growing up, I was given all these examples of people who changed the world. And most of them were people who had given up everything, of people who had gone in to serve other people or.
Had been seen as selfless people. There was no selfishness to them. And if you were just selfless enough, if you just gave up everything, that you could change the world. And I had a really religious background, so it was kind of told to me that if I was willing to give up everything, then I could really find my real purpose. If I was willing to give up the thing that I wanted the most in the world, that's when I could make God happy. That's when I could really have the big impact that I wanted. But as we look around our world and we look at the change that has really been created in this world, the problems that have been solved, the needy people who have been served, all of them have been helped the most by the profit motive, by entrepreneurs, by capitalists, by people who did something selfish, by people who wanted to make a billion dollars so they built a company that made a billion dollars, by companies like Apple, who change the way that we communicate, by change the way that we interact, by companies like Tesla. You know, we. Well, we might agree or disagree that the Earth, that the climate has some challenges that we need to solve. And we all might need to do our part, we need to give something up in order to fix what's broken. But the reality is that Elon Musk, the company Tesla, has done more to address climate change than the government or any large group of individuals has ever been able to do, ever. Because we're all operating with some amount of selfishness. And Elon Musk has made it easy for people to be green. Kermit the Frog was wrong when he said it's not easy being green. Elon Musk has made it easy, easier. He has made it cool to be green. And as a result, we will solve climate change because of selfishness, because of the profit motive, because of freedom. Real incomes have risen dramatically over the past few decades. We are inches away from stamping out poverty.
Real poverty, poverty that killed people 100 years ago. We are on the cusp of extending lifespans, maybe indefinitely. We are on the cusp of solving a myriad of diseases. And this is not because of government involvement. It is not because of people being selfless. It is because of people pursuing some sort of change, whether that change is they wanted to change their bank accounts or they wanted to change some big problem in the world. And the only way to solve a big problem is to do it profitably. It's why removing the profit motive from any industry, whether it is healthcare or communication or the climate, is the worst thing that we can do. Because we will solve problems faster if we allow the profit motive to allow us all to be selfish enough to care enough to make that change. So if you want to change the world, become an entrepreneur, solve a problem, and you don't have to do it selflessly. You just have to provide more value than you are taking. And as a result, you will receive more than you could possibly imagine by providing more value to the rest of the world. People like Jeff Bezos, people like Elon Musk, people like Steve Jobs, they have really changed the world and have gotten insanely rich because they've made our lives better. Entrepreneurship and freedom is the greatest change that we can make in your life and the rest of the world. And even if it's done selfishly, it's the most giving thing that you could possibly do for the world. So if you want to have an impact, be an entrepreneur, solve a problem, invest, pursue what you desire most. You'll be happier, and the rest of the world will be better because you followed your own selfishness.
