Life goes on! Rico Sharp Motivations

Yes, sir. All right, so let me tell you who I am. My name is Rico Sharp. I'm a motivational speaker, and one of the things that I'm used to, one of the things that like fits the element that I dwell in, is people making noise and talking and communicating and clapping and cheering and laughing, sometimes crying. And all of those emotions are expressed in my meetings, and it's important that you Not only listen, but to let go, let loose, embrace this moment, and allow for yourself to really feel empowered tonight. And sometimes— how many of you ever been to a basketball, football, soccer, hockey game, or anything like that? How many of you know there's a lot of noise, there's a lot of excitement, that the energy is high in that arena, right? In that stadium. Yes. And that's similar to what a motivational night is about. So if I say to you, hey, how are you guys doing? Y'all say, uh, good evening, we all right. Well, that's not really matching the energy that we're going to need in this place tonight. Now if I say to you, hi, how are you guys doing tonight? And y'all say, we're doing great, then that matches the energy that we want. I'm here tonight to empower you and to share some things with you, and I want to be able to maximize this time with you. So let me start over and ask you guys, hey, how are you guys doing tonight? We're doing great! Oh, that's much better, but I believe we got a little bit more that we can give. All right, so I'm gonna try one more time. Hi, how are you guys doing tonight? We're doing great! Excellent, excellent. As I mentioned, my name is Rico Sharp, and I came from the Daytona Beach area To speak to you tonight. So I drove like 4 hours to be able to come speak to you tonight, and I'm excited. I'm looking forward to what's going to happen in your life. I'm looking forward to how things are going to shape up and become what you want it to become. How many of you have a dream in life? Great, great. And obviously the statement is clear because you're here in this school of higher learning To earn a vocational trade that you can use in your life to help realize your dream, to bring your dreams into reality. And I'm tonight, I want to be a friend of yours and just tell you that no matter what you're going through in life, you can get past it. You can get through it. You can get over it. I'm going to share my story with you tonight and and let you learn a little bit about me and. Then I'm going to talk tonight on a very important subject. This is Suicide Prevention Month, and I'm going to talk to you on the subject of overcoming life's challenges and not allowing for yourself to yield or submit to the force of fatigue— mental fatigue, psychological fatigue, emotional fatigue— and ultimately life's Fatigue. Now, I'd like to start my meetings out with asking you to stand, and if you don't mind, just gravitate to your feet for a moment. I was at the South Miami campus this morning and spoke with them and had a wonderful time. And the old saying is, they save the best for last. So I'm glad to be here with you, and I'm grateful to Christian and to Thank you. To all of your staff here for giving me this opportunity to be able to be here with you tonight. And thank you for letting me have some of your time. So there's this thing that we call a declaration, right, which is an audible profession. How many of you realize that your words have power? How many of you realize that through words negativity is released into the atmosphere? And how many of you also realize that through the power of words, positive energy is released into the atmosphere? It is true that what you say, you will inherit. It is true that what you think, you will become. And it is true that when you start releasing positive energy, positive energy will return back to you. I know that from my own personal life. So what I'm going to ask you to do is make a declaration tonight and And just look at somebody on your left and your right and repeat after me. And when you repeat after me, say it like you mean it and put some force behind it. There's no one here but us tonight, and we're gonna have a good time in here tonight, all right? So go ahead and look at somebody on your left and your right and tell them, you are special. You are special. You have greatness on your life. You have greatness on your life. You are talented. You are talented. You are gifted. You are gifted. You are creative. You are creative. There is nothing that you can't accomplish. There is nothing that you can't do. There is nothing that you can't have. I believe in you, and I see you in your future living your dreams. Now give yourself a round of applause, if you don't mind. Now one more time before you take your seat. Put your hand right here on your chest, and the words that you just said to the person standing next to you, I now want you to say those words concerning your own life, okay? And when you say it, mean it. When you say it, feel it. When you say it, believe it. So repeat after me. Say, I am special. I have greatness in my life. I am talented. I am powerful. I am gifted. I am creative. I believe I can accomplish all of my dreams. All things are possible for me. I will realize my dream, and I can see myself in my future doing mighty things with my life. I believe it. I said it, and I believe it will come to pass. Now give yourself a round of applause. Thank you. Thank you. You may be seated. Now, I want to talk to you tonight for a few minutes about where I come from and what my passion is about and how I've arrived to this place. But before I talk to you about my story, I want to tell you a little bit about my success, a little bit about my accomplishments. I've been speaking motivationally for 33 years, 33 years, and I'm a mentor to professional athletes in the NBA, NFL, and a couple of WBO boxers. I've started my own speaking television show several years ago that broadcasts around the world. And I also was, was advertising on 3 different television stations. I also had a couple of radio stations that I spoke on that advertised my voice and my impact in the local communities. I started a transitional house for homeless people several years ago to get homeless people off the street and people who were incarcerated who who were coming out of jails and prisons, people that no one else wanted. And I would bring them into my facility and I would help them to renew their thinking, to change their minds, to recalibrate their dispositions, to overcome their dysfunctions. I would help them to get their lives together, to get jobs, to be restored back to their families, to get off of drugs, to get away from the criminal lifestyle. And I would help them to be able to gain a new identity and begin to live a successful life and become a contributor in society. Some of the other things that I did is I started speaking in jails and speaking in prisons. And not only do I speak in jails and prisons to men and women and, and juvenile detention centers to young juveniles, but I also speak for the federal government. On August 12th and the 15th, I was in Tampa, Florida speaking to FBI agents, teaching leadership workshops to FBI agents, to HUD agents, which stands for Housing Urban Development agents, to Defense Intelligence agents, and even people out of the Oval Office with President Joe Biden. A couple of weeks before that, I was in New York for a leadership conference where 30 colleges came together in Times Square And I was their keynote speaker, and I did a workshop teaching on leadership. A few days after being in New York, I was in a prison in Arcadia, Florida, speaking to hundreds of men, telling them not to ever give up, to keep their hope, to keep their faith, and to utilize the time that they have incarcerated learning how to become the best version of themselves and realizing that the issue is not with being in the physical jail, but the issue was being in a mental jail. Because before someone is ever arrested and thrown in the back seat of a squad car and hauled off to the county jail or the state penitentiary, they had to be arrested first in their mind. They were confined in their mind. They were bound in their mind. They were incarcerated in their thinking. And whenever you're incarcerated in your thinking, you're incarcerated in your life. Amen. Whenever you're incarcerated mentally, you will eventually become incarcerated physically. So I talk to them about that. I go into high schools and I talk to kids in high school. I do workshops for teachers. I'm a speaker. I go around the world wherever I'm invited. I go, I speak in churches, I speak on other people's television stations. I enjoy empowering people To overcome adversity and to live their best life. And it is important to understand not only what I do today, but it's equally important, if not even more imperative, to understand how it all started and where it all began in my life. You see, my story, ladies and gentlemen, does not start with me being a mentor, a counselor, a life coach. motivator, a public speaker. My story does not start with me being a leadership trainer. My story does not start with me being an interpersonal skill developer. My story began when I was 13 years of age. At the age of 13, ladies and gentlemen, I was a straight-A student in high school, having some problems at home, having some issues because I felt unloved, unwanted, unaccepted. I felt like nobody really wanted me around. My mother, who loved me dearly, who did her best, gave birth to 3 sons by the time she was 16 years of age. My mother, who loved me dearly and did her best for me and my brothers, could not afford financially to take care of me. Because I was born at the age— at her age of 14. So she handed me off to someone who was more financially stable, and that person took care of me and raised me until I was 5 years of age. And then about the age of 5, she handed me back to my mom because she had to go into the hospital for an extended stay. And when she handed me back to my mom, my mom did her best with me. Out of pure love, out of pure effort, she tried. But there were times that times got too tough and she would hand me off to a family member to go and stay with a family member. Then there were times that she would say, hey, you can go and stay with church family members, you know, not real biological members, but if you're in a church together and you're real close, you're considered family. Then there were times she said, you need to go live with your dad. My dad was a drug dealer living on the other side of town. My dad was a very abusive man, somebody that I was terrified of, because whenever he did come home to be with my 2 brothers and my mom and I, he came home to beat us up. He would be there for about a week. He would mentally abuse us, physically abuse us, verbally abuse us, and then he would turn around and head out the door and go back over there when the coast was clear. at his other family's house. And so I was afraid of this man. And when I got 13 years of age, my mom came to me and she said, Rico, I can't do anything with you. I have to send you to go live with your father. And in my mind I'm thinking, no, no, that man will kill me. I can't go live with him. Consequently, at that same time, In the 9th grade, there were some kids in my class, and these kids had it going on. They had money in their pocket, they had on nice Adidas, they had gold chains around their neck, they had gold teeth in their mouth. The girls wanted to be with them and the guys wanted to be like them, and they found me as being a cool fella to hang out with. And I started building a little attachment with these guys in my class. And one day when I decided that I couldn't go live with my dad, I decided these guys, they accept me, they understand me, they embrace me. I'm going to go live with them. And so at the age of 13, with an undeveloped, immature mind, I made an immature decision. to run off from home and to go live on the side of town where these guys lived in my class. I had no idea at that time that these guys were drug dealers. I had no idea that these guys would not take me into their home. I had no idea that these guys didn't really care for me like I thought they did. And the very first day I ran off, I found myself homeless at the age of 13. I'm sleeping under an oak tree, eating out of trash cans, waiting for people to finish eating their food, and whatever leftovers they left, I would come out and get it and go back to my little hiding spot under the oak tree. And I survived like that for months. In the wintertime. No clothing, no money, no food, no family, no support, no toothpaste, no toothbrush, no change of clothing, no soap, no bath rag, not even an extra pair of underwear. And for months I'm sleeping under this oak tree in the rain, in the cold, at the age of 13. Trying to stay up all night long because there were several times I found myself having to get up and run for my life just to survive the night. And then one night under that oak tree, this car passed by and stopped, and the guy let the window down and he said to me, why are you always sleeping out here under this tree? Why are you hanging out here at this time of night? Every time I come by, I see you here. I replied back, because I don't have anywhere to go. I don't have any place to live. He said to me, come and get in my car. I went and got in his car. He took me to his rooming house where he and other drug dealers lived. And when I arrived to the rooming house, I felt what I considered at that time love. I felt accepted. I felt embraced. I felt like I found my family. And in my little heart, I became loyal and committed to those guys. They fed me. They bought me a change of clothing. They put a couple of dollars in my pocket. But after a week or so, the guy who picked me up, he said to me, he said, Rico, if you're going to survive in these streets, You gotta learn how to hustle. You have to make money. And he handed me a bag of crack cocaine, and he said to me at the age of 13, go out there on the corner and sell these drugs and bring me so much off of this bag of drugs, and you keep the rest. And this is how you're going to survive out here in the street. In my immature mind, I had no idea what I was about to get myself into. I had no idea that I had options. I had no idea that there were other alternatives for me. So what did I do? I took his offer. I got the bag of drugs. I went to the corner and I started selling drugs. And at the age of 13, I became a drug dealer. One of the guys that were also a drug dealer introduced me to alcohol. He said, hey man, you can't buy it, but you can drink it. And he handed me alcohol and I started drinking. And at the age of 13, I became addicted to alcohol. Another guy walked up to me and handed me a joint of marijuana. And he said, I know you're only 13, but here, hit this. And I grabbed it and I started smoking that joint. And then sometime later, I'm hanging out with these guys and we're having a party, and a group of guys are snorting powder cocaine. And I walked over and watched them for a while, and one of the guys walked over to me at the age of 13. And handed me powder cocaine and said, sniff this. And I sniffed it. And at the age of 13, I'm addicted to alcohol, addicted to marijuana, and addicted to powder cocaine. And from that point on, my life fastly began to encounter a downward spiral. It wouldn't be long after I'm standing up on the corner and a police officer come up and And he see me standing there drinking a beer at the age of 13. I was so naive, I didn't even realize that it was illegal for me to have an open can of beer in front of the police officer. While he's walking toward me, I'm turning the can up, drinking like I got a cup full of Kool-Aid. He grabbed me, put my arms behind my back, put handcuffs on me, hauled me off to the juvenile detention center. When I got there, I called my mom. My mom came and got me out. I went right back to the streets. Sometime later, I got arrested again. Mom got me out. I went right back to the streets. Sometime later, I got arrested and went back to the juvie, came back to the street. A few years would pass. Now I'm 17. I got arrested. What happened? and taken to the adult county jail. A couple of years would pass. I got arrested again, arrested again, arrested again, arrested again, arrested again. Then the judge says, I'm sentencing you to the state penitentiary. And he sent me to prison. I went to prison, I got out, continued to do it wrong. A year later, I got sent right back to prison. Went to prison the second time and got out. 10 months later, I got sent right back to prison. I would be arrested 19 different times and sent to prison 3 different times. But ladies and gentlemen, something happened in my life on that 19th time. Something happened in my life on that last time in prison. There was an older Caucasian gentleman who saw how young and how lost I was. And he decided to take me under his wing and be like a father to me. His name was Billy. Billy had did like 30 years in prison and was never going home. Billy had accumulated his own personal library, but Billy had no family on the outside to support him. And so Billy made a decision or an agreement with me that if I would give him my commissary money, so that he can buy cigarettes and coffee, then I can buy his library. And that meant a lot to me because I had dropped out of school in the 9th grade as a straight-A student, and I felt like I needed to educate myself and begin to take my life serious. I made a deal with Billy to buy all of his books. I bought from Billy an almanac. I bought from Billy an encyclopedia. I bought from Billy a dictionary. I bought from Billy Bibles, self-help programs that were in books that were being sent into prison by outside organization. I bought commentaries and everything that Billy had, I bought. And I would go to my dorm, my little room, and I would sit down and spread all my books out on my box. And for 10 hours, 12 hours a day for years, I would read, I would study, I would learn, I would memorize. And I became self-educated in prison. And I made a decision, ladies and gentlemen, while in prison on that night, on that third time in prison, 19th time being arrested, that I have something special. That I have greatness in my life, that I will not live and die a drug dealer. I will not live and die as a criminal. I will not live and die as a young man who has a mistaken identity. I will not live and die as a lawless, ruthless young man with no purpose in life. I made a decision to change. I made a decision to look interpersonally and to look internally and discover what my potential is. what my gifts and my creativity is. And from that moment on, my life began to change. And on November 30th, 1995, I was released from prison. And when I walked out of the prison, down on my knees I went. I bowed and I kissed the pavement, and I made a promise to myself That I'm never coming back to prison again as an inmate. I'm never coming back as somebody who is incarcerated. But if I ever come back, I'm coming back to help those who are incarcerated to get free in their mind, to get free in their thinking, so that they too can discover the life that I discovered on the inside. November 30th of this— of '25 will be 30 years. November 30th of 2025 will be 30 years that I've been out of prison. And if nobody else celebrates my breakthrough, I celebrate my breakthrough all by myself. Now I'm teaching educators now. I'm doing leadership training with scholars, theologians, and people who have arrested me and thrown in jail. See, ladies and gentlemen, life is what you make it. Life is what you make it. Say this with me: life is what I make it. Come on, put a little bit more behind it and let me hear you say life Life is what I make it. Life is what I make it. Do me a favor and look at your hands, if you will. Put your hands in front of you and look at your hands and say this with me: my life is in my hands. My life is in my hands. That's so true. Your life is not in anyone else's hand. Your life is in your hand, and your life will be what you make it to be. And so for the next 30 minutes, I want to talk to you on this subject, life goes on. Life goes on. Let me hear you say that. Life goes on. Life goes on. One more time. Life goes on. Life goes on. So if you're taking notes, I want you to write these things down. The first thing that I want to submit to you tonight, ladies and gentlemen, is that life is a gift. We call it the present. I saw many people lose their life, including family members. That I had to pick up off the ground and throw it in the back seat of a car with their blood all over me and rush them to the hospital, only for them to die in the emergency room. Sometimes people don't value their life. Sometimes people don't realize the worth of having only one life to live and how imperative it is that you take your life serious. But life is a gift. Life is a present. And time, it is precious. It's your greatest asset. It's the only thing in this world that you can't get back once it's passed. Life is given to you for you to love, to laugh, to listen, to learn, and to live. Your life has meaning and purpose even when you feel like you're at your lowest point, and even if Tomorrow feels uncertain. You have a future, and it's always worth fighting for. As I mentioned earlier, September is Suicide Prevention Month, and there are so many people that we've heard of over the years that baffles us and that confuses us in terms of why would they take their life. Kate Spade. Robin Williams, Anthony Bourdain— why would they take their life? Why would they commit suicide? What is it that's so bad about the lifestyle they live that they no longer want to live it? You see, ladies and gentlemen, you could be rich and have everything you want in this world and still not live in harmony with yourself. Deion Sanders once said, Knowing that he had millions of dollars in the bank, that one day driving home he didn't feel like he wanted to live anymore. He proceeded to drive his car right off the cliff to take his life. By divine intervention and the grace of God, he survived. He's able to now coach football and talk about it. See, when you're on the outside, you can't see on the inside what people are really dealing with internally. Sometimes you can have everything that you want in life, but if you don't have you, then the stuff you have matters not. You are your greatest possession. You are your most prized possession. And I know many of us, we have kids, we have husbands, we have wives, we have mothers and fathers, we have brothers and sisters, We have friends and confidants. We have associates. Some of us got what we call Facebook friends, which are really not friends at all. But no matter who you have in your life, your most prized possession is you. You have no greater responsibility in life than to take care of you. Please understand this. You have no greater responsibility in life than to take care of you. I have 3 kids and a grandson, and I love each and every one of them with all my heart. And it's my responsibility to do for them for as long as I live. But I have no greater responsibility than to take care of me, because if I don't take care of me, then I cannot take care of them. Anyone ever been on a cruise before? Anyone ever been on an airplane before? When you go through the safety briefing on the airplane and on the cruise, the very first thing they tell you, that in the event of an emergency on the airplane, put your oxygen mask on first. And the event of an emergency on a cruise ship, put your vest on first. Your life vest goes on first. Why? Because you can't save anyone else if you are dying yourself. Your greatest responsibility is to take care of you. When you were a child under your parents' tutelage, when you were a child under your parents' jurisdiction, it was your job— it was their job to take care of you. It was your job to submit to them, to do what they asked and required of you. It was their job to put food on the table, to look after you. To make sure that you had the needs met, to make sure that you had the sufficiency of all things. But when you became 18 or 21, whenever they determined it was the age of accountability for you, from that moment on, the title deeds to your life was handed to you. From that moment on, jurisdiction for your life was handed over to you. And from that day to this day, It's your responsibility to take care of you. But understand that when I say take care of you, I'm not just talking about feed you, buy you clothing, put shoes on your feet, buy you nice cars and nice things. I'm not talking about just pay your bills. I'm talking about, ladies and gentlemen, to take care of you mentally, to take care of your mind, to take care of your mental health, to make sure that you are being healthy in all areas of your life. To make sure that you are keeping yourself in harmony with what you want to accomplish in life. Because the truth is, ladies and gentlemen, you only get one chance at life and you only get one you. You can have 5 kids, you can have 3 wives, 2 husbands, you can have 12 grandchildren, 4 dogs, 2 cats, 7 cars, One job, 2 jobs, 3 jobs, but you only get one of you. You don't get to trade you in at a certain state in life. You got one chance to make sure that you're living your best life and that you're not just living after the better version of yourself, but you're living after the best version of yourself. Say this with me: My responsibility is to take care of me. Point number two: Understand that life is not perfect, and no one has the perfect solution to life. So it's perfectly okay to be imperfect and not have it all together. It's perfectly okay to be imperfect. And not perfectly have it all together. There are people who would try to project themselves as having it all together. As much as I counsel and mentor people and have clients around the country that pays me to talk to me on an hourly basis, can I tell you, as much as I help other people to sort out their issues in their life and the problems in their life, I, Rico Sharp, am not perfect. And guess what, ladies and gentlemen? I'm cool with that. I'm cool with making mistakes. I'm cool with not having it all together. I'm cool with falling down sometimes. I'm cool with getting tired sometimes. I'm cool with not feeling my best at times. That's okay with me. You know why? Because I understand That if I try to live a perfect life, I'm putting unnecessary pressure on my life that is totally non-realistic. When you try to keep up with the Joneses and be like someone else, you put pressure on yourself to live at a level that is going to deteriorate your energy. You can't keep up with the Joneses. How many of you realize that the Joneses went bankrupt a long time ago? That's just to say, but the truth of the matter is you don't have to try to perform and outperform others. You just have to perform at the best of your own peak and ability. Life is what you make it. So that means if you mess it up, you have the power to clean it up. You see, who would have ever imagined that a 13-year-old boy who was addicted to cocaine, addicted to marijuana, addicted to alcohol, got locked up 19 times, would one day be traveling the world speaking to people. When I get back to my hometown, I got to do a speaking conference online on Saturday. Yesterday I spoke twice for this corporation. To help them to understand that you got to give life all you have to give. This morning I spoke at the South Miami campus. I'm always somewhere seeking opportunities to empower people. Who would have ever thought that somebody like me who dropped out of high school in the 9th grade could have a life where I'm fulfilling my purpose? You You know what, ladies and gentlemen? I discovered this. If I mess my life up, I have the power to straighten my life up. If I have the power to mess my life up, then I also have the power to straighten my life up. Say this with me. If I have the power— If I have the power— To make mistakes— To make mistakes— I also have the power— I also have the power— To learn from my mistakes. How many of you know that's true? You turn your setbacks into your setups. Understand this, no matter how dark the night may seem, there is a sunrise on the other side. Over the last 5 years, there are 14 family members who have died that I loved and that I cared for, and then friends and people That I thought would always be around. 2 of those family members are my father and my brother. My brother passed away last month— a year ago. In other words, he passed away a year ago in August of last year. My brother was somebody that I cared about a lot. I took care of— I helped them out a lot. My brother had a broken heart. Life beat him down. Life beat him up. He has some real problems, real struggles, and real challenges. And I poured into him and labored with him and did everything that I could to help him to understand that, Felix, life goes on, bro. At the last conversation I had with him, not realizing it would be our last conversation, I said— I went to the house to visit with him, and when I sat there on the porch to talk with him, I asked him, I said, Felix, how are you doing? He just looked at me with weak eyes and he shook his head, didn't say a word. Then he dropped his head. I said, bro, talk to me, tell me how you doing. And he looked up over at me again and he shook his head, and then he dropped his head again. I said, bro, I know it's tough, man, but you know you can make it, right? You know you have what it takes, right? You know everything's going to be all right. He looked at me again and he shook his head and he dropped his head again. And I said, Phyllis, I said, man, I'm here for you. I love you, bro. I said, how would you like to go fishing with me? And he smiled and he said, yeah. And when I started telling him that I'm going to come back and take him fishing He started engaging a little bit and he talked to me for a couple of minutes. And in our final conversation that I would soon learn that it would be, he basically said to me, don't let life kill you. Don't let life destroy you. I said, don't worry, bro, I'm gonna take you fishing. I'll be back here in a few days to take you fishing. I got a phone call the next week that my brother had died. I didn't get the chance to take him fishing. You see, Phineas had a very hard life, ladies and gentlemen, to the point where he suffered with mental health. And I didn't realize at the time just how heavy his soul had become. But Felix was hit in the head by his brother-in-law with a golf club in the hotel room, using drugs with his brother-in-law. And his brother-in-law pulled out a golf club hallucinating and hit Felix in the head and broke his skull and thrust a 6-inch piece of his skull down into his brain. And paralyzed him instantly on the right side of his body, threw him into the bathtub, pulled the shower curtain, ran out the hotel room, and left him in the bathtub to die. The next day, the room attendant came to clean the room and saw a trail of blood from the bathroom leading to the tub, pulled the shower curtain back, and there my brother is lying. In a pool of blood, clinging to life with hours left to live. Got rushed to the hospital. Doctors didn't think he would make it through the night, but by the grace of God, he survived. Through divine intervention, he survived. They had to create a new skull for him. They had to put a tube in his brain. And eventually, the fetus would spend months and months in the hospital learning how to talk again, learning how to walk again. Having totally lost his memory, didn't even know who hit him. But that's not all. Fetus' 6-year-old daughter died from brain cancer, and he watched her die right there in the house with him. Fetus got addicted to drugs. Fetus got addicted to crack cocaine, and because of his drug use, his wife divorced him. The love of his life. And Phyllis felt like, I can't go on like this. Phyllis was walking home one day and got hit by a car, and it broke up every bone just about on his right side. Phyllis felt like he couldn't go on. Phyllis felt like he had no— nothing left to live for. And all he could do is apologize. That he didn't make life what he had hoped that he would make it. Ladies and gentlemen, I am sharing my brother's story with you because I want you to know that when life seems unbearable, when it seems intolerable, when it seems like you can't go on, when it seems like you have nothing left to live for, you have to stop for a moment and say, I cannot die here. I cannot die now. I have to find a reason To fight. I have to find a reason to live. I have to get help in the state of my mental health. I have to seek the professional support that I need to overcome sorrow, to overcome grief, to overcome regret, to overcome my pain. When people commit suicide, it's not that they don't want to live. They want to silence the pain. They want to silence the voices in their soul. They want to escape from what they feel inside. I used to think that when people committed suicide that they were weak. This is long before I knew better. But then I realized that people who commit suicide, it wasn't that they were weak, they felt abandoned. They felt alone. They felt hopeless. How many of you know someone who committed suicide? I have a cousin named Dee Dee. About 6 months ago, his daughter went to the jail to go visit with him. Dee Dee didn't get a chance to visit with his daughter because he was in medical. She got very disappointed that she didn't get a chance to see him. Her father on her birthday. Later on, she was able to do a Zoom video conference with him from jail because it was her birthday. After she said goodbye to her daddy, 2 o'clock in the morning, she pulled the gun out and shot herself in the head and took her life. Suicide is real, ladies and gentlemen. Mental health is real, ladies and gentlemen. I had a friend of mine, his name's Odell Hunt. Odell was the party. He was the party, uh, he was the guy who was the life of the party. He was the guy that when he showed up, everyone was happy, everyone was glad to be around him. Odell brought positive energy into the room. If you were down and feeling dejected, when Odell showed up, you felt great because Odell's gonna make you laugh. Odell's gonna make you feel good. That's right. good about yourself. Odell traveled with me to go to certain places where we would renew our minds and we would work on being in environments where men were transforming their lives. And I would take Odell with me because Odell was a good guy. He was a friend of mine. One night I got a phone call from Odell's mom. Odell's mom was crying on the phone. I said, Miss Hunt, What's wrong? Took her a while before she can gain her composure enough to speak. She said to me, she said, Odell is gone. I said, what do you mean? She said, he took his life. I said, what happened? She said, he stepped in front of a moving train, took his life. Crushed my little heart. devastated his mom's life. One would think, man, Odell, come on, bro, what's, what's so bad about life that you would end it so violently and so drastically? Nobody knew that Odell had these struggles with mental health. You see, ladies and gentlemen, mental health is an invisible enemy, and it lives in the best of us. There are times that some of you, you might— you may not admit it here because you have a certain image, but there are times that some of you have had thoughts in your mind about suicide. There are times in my life I've had thoughts about taking my life. There are times where we Feel exasperated, depleted. There are times when we feel like we can't go on. There are times when we feel like yielding to the temptation to quit. There are times we want to take the towel and throw it in. There are times we want to wave the flag of surrender because life is real. Pain is real. Mental health is real. Being depressed is real. Having darkness in your soul is real. Feeling like you're out of hope is real. Feeling helpless is real. When I go into jails and I go into prisons and I talk to people, I remind them that you got a reason to live. You got a reason to fight. You got a reason to believe in you. You got a reason to hope to see the light of another day. And many of these men and women have life sentences and And according to the judicial system, they're never getting out again. Say this with me, life goes on. Life goes on. Are y'all still with me? Yes. Point number 3, you need a reason for living, and it has to exceed materialistic accumulation. You can't just live for a house and a car. There has to be something that's more valuable. There has to be something more definitive. You can't, you can't live just to be rich. There has to be something more, more true, more genuine, and more sincere within your heart. Something like a passion, something like a dream, something like purpose, something like wanting to affect change in the lives of others, something like wanting to be here for other people. And I submit to you, ladies and gentlemen, that each and every one of us, we need a why. Why? And we need a who in our lives. Your why is your inspiration. It's why you do what you do. It's why you wake up every morning. It's why you go to work in the day and take care of your children and take care of your household and then get dressed and come to school at night. There's a why. There's a reason. You're doing it because that's your aspiration. Being successful is your aspiration. Moving on in life, that's your aspiration. But not only do you need a why, you need a who. Your who represents those you do it for. How many of you have kids? Raise your hand. How many of you are married? Raise your hand. How many of you are taking care of a household? Raise your hand. See, your who represents the people in your life that's dependent on you, the people in your life that's counting on you, the people in your life that believes in you, that supports you, that stands behind you as your vertebrae to give you the support and the undergirding that you need. Your who is your motivation. And whenever life gets tough and life gets difficult, whenever life gets challenging, you must always remember your why and your who. Why? Because there is a man named Mr. Murphy. Anybody ever heard of Mr. Murphy? Murphy's Law? Yeah. Yeah, Mr. Murphy. Murphy's Law says whatever can go wrong will go wrong. Whatever can fall apart will fall apart. Whatever can break down on you will break down on you. And when Mr. Murphy shows up, Mr. Murphy shows up to test your strength. Mr. Murphy shows up to test your will. Mr. Murphy shows up to test what you're made of. Mr. Murphy shows up to see how committed you are to your why and how committed you are to your who. There are people that started out in this school, this class, this semester with you, but has already fallen off, have already Turned back on their commitment. You know why? Because they didn't have a why. They didn't have a who. There are times in life where life is going to get challenging, and you got to ask yourself, what is my reason for living, and who are the people I'm living for? Point number 4. Always be willing to reach out for help. I use the word help as acronyms for healthy, encouraging, or empowering loving people. H-E-L-P. Healthy, encouraging, or empowering loving people. Always surround yourself with people who love you genuinely. Who are not in your life for money. People who can look beyond your faults and see your deeds. People who say, man, I, I love you, and I don't have to have a specific reason why. Sometimes we find that in our family. Sometimes we find that in our significant others. But when you don't have anyone around you, then you find yourself feeling secluded and isolated. And then you find yourself deteriorating and diminishing to the pressure That life puts on you, because life wants to catch you alone. It's just like a lion chasing after a herd of wildebeest. The lion waits for the one that's straggling, that's lagging behind, that's back there by itself, because it knows it has a better chance of taking that one down when the herd is not there to defend it. Ladies and gentlemen, you always need to have someone around you That believes in you and that loves you without a cause. Share what you're going through with someone you trust. Talk to a friend, a family member, a counselor, a pastor, a therapist. Call a suicide hotline when you find yourself struggling with mental health issues, with depression, with feeling inadequate, with feeling like your life doesn't matter. Tell yourself that you are not alone and surround yourself with people who care about you. Because sometimes you got to get around people who can lend their life to you until you're able to build your own life. Sometimes you got to get around people who can love you until you're able to love yourself. Sometimes you got to get around people who will go to battle for you until you're able to go to battle for yourself. Does that make sense to you? Say this with me, life goes on. Life goes on. Come on, give me a little bit more. Say, life goes on. Life goes on. Give me about 10 more minutes or so and I'll stop. Number 5, create a safety plan to protect you. Remove access to lethal weapons. Make sure that any potentially dangerous items such as firearms, medications, or sharp objects are not easily accessible when you find yourself going through mental health challenges. Life can sometimes feel overwhelming, ladies and gentlemen. Life can make you feel like you're standing at the edge of the cliff with the weight of the world on your shoulder. Life will make you feel like jumping off the cliff. And I say to you that if you do jump off the cliff, make sure you tie a bungee cord around your waist before you jump so that when you go down, you can come back up bigger, better, stronger, and Amen. Do not let life kill you. Do not let depression deprive you. And do not allow mental health to mesmerize your life and to destroy the very fiber of your existence. Point number 6. Identify warning signs and leap into action. See, to yourself be true. If you know you're challenged with mental health challenges and you know that you're having some struggles and you know that you're depressed and you know that the things that you enjoy doing that you don't want to do anymore, you, you, you know that you— the things you enjoy, uh, Engaging in, you don't want to engage anymore. And the people you like hanging out with, you don't want to hang out with them anymore. And the places you like to go, you don't want to go anymore. And you just want to sit in the in a dark room, and you just want to be alone, and you don't want to talk to nobody, and you don't want to be bothered. Listen, those are signs. Those are signs. Those are signs to let you know that you're drifting. Right. Those are signs to let you know when you go into your man cave, your woman's cave, that you're going in to become a caveman and a cavewoman. And it is in that man cave, it's in that solitude, it is in that place where you find yourself alone that mental health is at its best. See, I built the man cave in my house, and one day I found myself sitting in the darkness for about 6 hours. No TV, no light, no phone, just sitting there. Didn't even know why, didn't know how to walk out, didn't even feel it necessary to walk out. Just sitting there, allowing for the weight of the world To compress me, to squeeze me, trying to choke the life out of me. Mental health, ladies and gentlemen, when it is not addressed, it becomes a boa constrictor. It becomes a python. And every time you take a breath, it tightens up its grip and it wraps around you so that it can suck and drain The very life out of you. I've had times where I've gone into jails and prisons, I've gone into churches, I've gone into mental institutions, I've gone into rehabs, I've gone into federal institutions, I've gone into corporate America, I've gone into different places talking to different people about different things. And it almost always happened that a week or two after I go I get one or two phone calls. One that says, man, I'm so glad you came, you changed my life. And two, unfortunately, somebody who was in my meeting that did not take life serious, that did not take the moment serious, that did not take the warning signs serious, end up losing their life. It happens. It happens. And then number 7, life is a fight and only the strong shall survive. Can I say to you that life is not fair? When I called my mom and told my mom that my brother passed away, hearing her heart, hearing her scream, knowing she had just lost her husband a couple of years before that, and having to tell her that her son is now dead, it took every breath out of my body. And she said these words. She said, life wasn't fair to Phyllis. And I said to Mom, I said, Mom, you're right, but life is not designed to be fair. Can I tell you this? Can you, can you, can y'all hear me good in this room tonight? Yeah. Can I tell you life is not designed to be fair? If you're looking for a fair life, then you're looking for a fairy tale. Life is not designed to be fair. You know what life is designed to be? Life is designed to be a fight. Say this with me: life is not designed to be fair. Life is not designed to be fair. Life is designed to be a fight. Life is a fight. And can I tell you that only the strong shall survive? And so you got to put on your Mike Tyson boxing glove, you got to strap on your Rambo boots, and you got to tell life, bring it on. Is it going to get hard sometimes? Yes. It's going to get difficult sometimes? Yes. Are you going to feel like crying? Yes. Are you going to be divorced by some people in Yes. Are people going to abandon you? Yes. Are you going to get sick sometimes? Yes. Will your car break down? Yes. Will people you love die in your arms? Yes. But ladies and gentlemen, I discovered that when things go wrong, don't go with them. Say this with me: when things go wrong, don't go with them. You know what else I discovered? When people go to the grave, don't go with them. Say this with me: when people go to the grave, don't go with them. Don't go with them. You know what else I discovered? I discovered that when people walk off and leave me, I don't get the pleasure to walk off and leave me. Which is point number 8. Do not give up on you. Never ever give up on you. People will divorce you, people will fire you, people will disenfranchise or disassociate themselves from you, people will cut you off like a bad habit and seemingly for no reason at all. People will disrespect you, people will call you out of your name, People will be so negative to you that they will make you feel like that there's something wrong with you. But when people take advantage of the time that is given for them to love and support you, and they take advantage of that time by trying to hurt you and degrade you, do not borrow their attitude toward you. Do not allow for how other people treat you to become. How you treat yourself. Do not give up on you. Anybody who disrespects you have a personal issue in their heart with disrespect. Do not borrow that. Do not accept that. In my years of growing up, as I was running around from house to house, I felt like something was wrong with me because nobody wanted me. Nobody wanted to hold on to me or keep me around. It had me growing up in life looking for acceptance. looking for family, looking for community, looking to be embraced, looking to be loved. Anybody ever felt that before? And I felt like I just didn't fit in. And that's what opened the door for me to land inside of a drug dealing family called the streets. 'Cause I was looking for something. But you know what I had to discover? That what I'm looking for out there, I really have in here, and I had to learn how to love myself. I had to learn how to live with me. And so I close with this. I want to give you some points to take home with you tonight. Number 1, always love you. Always love you. Always love you. If other people don't love you, you have to love you. Never ever allow for other people's lack of love toward you to become your lack of love towards yourself. Number 2, always believe in you. Believing in you empowers you to make your dream your reality. Believing in you empowers you to make your dream your reality. Number three, always be your best friend. Never be more of a friend to someone else than you are to yourself. Number four, always support you. It's your responsibility to be your biggest supporter in life. Never put off the jurisdiction of your own life into the care of someone else. It's your job to support you. That's why I say if you find yourself challenged with mental health issues. If you find yourself getting depressed, if you find yourself getting discouraged in life, if you find yourself having suicidal thoughts, if you find yourself contemplating hurting yourself, do something about it. Because you have to depend on you to always give you the support and the help you need in order to live in this world. Number 5, forgive you. This is a big one for a lot of people because we are experts and pros at forgiving other people, but we find it challenging and difficult to forgive ourselves. When we don't forgive ourselves, we live with this, this cancer called regret. We live with this cancer called remorse. When we don't forgive ourselves, we live with this cancer that deteriorates us And leave us in a state of needing life support. Because you can't live with regrets, remorse, and sorrow in your heart and it not eat you alive. I found out that when people turn to drugs and alcohol, it's not the drugs and the alcohol and the tobacco that creates mental health issues in their life. I found out that when people turn to drugs and alcohol, it's because they have mental health issues in their life, and they're looking for a way to escape the pain they feel and the challenges and the darkness they live with. You see, when you put drugs and alcohol in your body, whether you realize it or not, that is equivalent to committing suicide. It's the different process than putting a gun to your head. It's a different process than dying by Suicide by cops. It's a different process than driving your car off the cliff. This process only buys you a little more time, but when you put drugs and alcohol in your body, you're destroying your organs. It's a slow process, but it's still suicide. And then finally, make up in your heart to give life all you have to give. Make up in your heart to never ever pull the life support plug on you. Life is what you make it, ladies and gentlemen. And understand this, always reach for the moon, because even if you miss, you will land among the stars. Be willing to aim high and hit nothing rather than to aim low and hit everything. Most people fail at life not because they aim too high and miss, but because they aim too low and hit. Be willing to do today things that others won't do so that you can have tomorrow things that others won't have. Understand that your attitude towards life determines life's attitude toward you. So give to life the passion you aspire, and life will give to you the dream you desire. Understand that other people's opinions of you matters not to the dictation of your destiny. nor to the potential of your prosperity. But walk not in the shadows of those you admire, but discover your own passion and dare to aspire. For then you will realize your greatness and live a life that inspires. And think sharp, plan sharp, walk sharp, talk sharp, eat sharp, dress sharp, live sharp, and you will be sharp. Thank you for your time, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Rico Sharp. Rico Sharp. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. God bless you.