A speaker who received a terminal diagnosis argues that true victory isn't outlasting death but living fully. He warns that on your deathbed, unpursued talents and ideas will haunt you, and insists greatness isn't rare or pre-ordained but available to everyone willing to commit all-in, embrace failure, and choose love over fear.
Chapters
You can either live your dreams or live your fears. I think the majority of people actually are not living their dreams but are living their fears. There's absolutely no reason on the face of the earth that you should not reach for everything every single bright star in your horizon. Give everything that you've got to be that. Last August I was told that in all likelihood I had 3 to 6 months left to live. Somebody said to me in light of those numbers, "Wow, so you're really beating the Grim Reaper." And what I said without even thinking about it is, "We don't beat the Reaper by living longer. We beat the Reaper by living well." and living fully. For the reaper will come for all of us. The question is, what do we do between the time we're born and the time he shows up? Imagine, if you will, being on your deathbed and standing around your bed the ghost of the dreams, the ideas, the abilities, the talents given to you by life, but you, for whatever reason, you never pursued those dreams. You never acted on those ideas. You never used those gifts. You never used those talents. And there they are staring at you as you're lying on your bed with large angry eyes saying, "We came to you. Only you could have given us life. And now we must die with you forever." Greatness is not some esoteric quality that only a few of us have. It's not this God-given gift that is predetermined among us and only a few people have this innate quality to ever achieve greatness. No. Greatness lies in every single one of us. We all have the ability to become great. But the difference lies in what we're willing to do to get there and how we're gonna do it. You know, there's a certain redemptive power that making a choice has. [FOREIGN] Don't be afraid to fail. Go and experience life instead of reading about it. Go and experience life instead of asking someone else to tell you how to live life. Go out there and fail. Go out there and scrape your knees. Go out there and do the wrong thing. That way you now have an experience that acts as a tool to support you in the building of your life. Once you make a decision and you go all in and you say, I ain't quitting till I get there, I ain't giving up, I ain't giving in, I'll do whatever it takes, whatever it takes, I'll do whatever it takes to be successful. And when you make that decision, you, when you look you in the mirror, when you tell yourself that, look, I'm through, I'll do whatever it takes, I guarantee you, that's the day your City Field begins to happen. You, the people, have the power. The power to create machines. The power to create happiness. You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful. To make this life a wonderful adventure. You gotta be hungry. How hungry are you to reach your dreams? How hungry are you to reach your goals? Are you thirsty? It's a reset dream. Reset goal. What will be your mark when you leave this earth? You gotta be willing to get knocked down to reach your goals. You wanna talk about hurt? You wanna talk about pain? You wanna talk about trials? This is what you gonna have to go through to be great. You are just one day, you are just one move, you are just one thought of reaching your greatness. Of reaching that dream. Of reaching that moment that your mindset changes. You know what I believe? I believe your greatness is already in you. Your greatness is already in you. You just gotta get it out. What you need to do is look at that person in the mirror, look at their reflection, and tell that person, you will do it, you can do it. The cemetery— there you see potential never realized. There you find books never written. There you find ideas never acted on. Maybe that's why Henry David Rollison. Oh God, to reach the point of death only to realize that you've never lived, only to realize that you've never scraped the surface of your potential. When I look up at the night sky and I know that yes, we are part of this universe, we are in this universe, but perhaps more important than both of those facts is that the universe is in us. I want to do good. I want the world to be better because I was here. I want my life, I want my, my work, my family, I want it to mean something. And it's like, it has— if you are not making someone else's life better, then you're wasting your time. Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve, regardless of how many times you may have failed in the past or how lofty your aims and hopes may be. But all there will ever be is what's happening here and the decisions we make in this moment, which are based in either love or fear. Choose love and don't ever let fear turn you against your playful heart.
