In this opening session at Florida Central College, Rico Sharp delivers a high‑energy motivational presentation. He begins with a crowd‑participation affirmation exercise, urging students to declare their own greatness and belief in their abilities. Sharp then outlines the purpose of his visit: to empower, enlighten, and challenge students to recognize that success requires effort and resilience. He shares his personal narrative, describing how he dropped out of high school at 13, became homeless, addicted to drugs, and involved in crime until age 19. While incarcerated for the third time, he used commissary funds to purchase encyclopedias, dictionaries, a Bible, and other books, turning his prison bunk into a self‑study classroom and dedicating 8‑10 hours daily to reading and memorization. Upon release, he rejected street life, began speaking to youth on the streets, and gradually received invitations from county, state, and federal agencies to address inmates, students, and professionals. Over the ensuing decades he founded a church that grew to 3,000 members, launched a worldwide television show, built a property‑investment business, and mentored NBA, NFL, and boxing athletes. Throughout, he emphasizes that his transformation proves anyone can overcome adversity through internal focus, resilience, and leveraging personal gifts. The talk concludes with a call for students to internalize his story as proof that they, too, can achieve greatness despite challenges.
A little bit, I want to introduce our speaker this morning, Mr. Rico Sharp. He's going to give you a little bit about his background and walk you through some items today. So we're a small crowd, but we're loud, so let's clap and welcome him to Florida Central College.
Thank you, thank you very much. Good morning. How are you all doing? Great, great, great. Let me ask this, how are you all doing? Good, good, great, great. Can I ask you to stand for me for one moment? I got a certain way I always like to start my How many of you are excited about what your future holds? All right, right. So do this for me. Look at someone either on your left or right and simply say to them, "You have something special. You have greatness on your side. All things are possible, and you can accomplish anything and everything you set your heart and your mind on." All right. Now say this with me and be a little. little more forceful with this declaration. Put your hand right here and say, I am special. I am special. I have greatness on my life.
I have greatness on my life.
I can do anything.
I can do anything.
And everything.
And everything.
That I set my heart.
That I set my heart.
And my mind to accomplish.
And my mind to accomplish.
I believe in me. I believe in me. And I believe.
And I believe.
That all of my dreams.
That all of my dreams.
And my aspirations. And my aspirations. Will come to pass. Will come to pass. If you believe that, give yourself a round of applause. It's an honor to be here with you today. I'm grateful for the opportunity. I'm thankful to all of those wonderful people that work in this particular college. I've been around a couple of the FTC campuses. I'm grateful for Mr. Mike giving me this opportunity. Just last week I was at the Kissimmee campus. A couple of weeks before that I was at the DeLand campus. A couple of weeks coming up I'll be at the Pembroke Pine campus and then the South Florida campus. The purpose of my visit coming here today is to encourage you, to empower you, to enlighten you, to, to just get you to focus internally and begin to realize that you have greatness in your life, and to help you to understand that there are some things that are going to come in life but not without a fight, right? There are some things that's going to happen for you but not without challenges. And I'm a motivational speaker, I'm a public speaker, student success expert, life coach, mentor, mentor to NBA players, NFL players, and a couple of people in in the WBO boxing arena. And I enjoy helping people to overcome adversity through the power of being resilient, through interpersonal discovery, through learning what you have on the inside and being able to really connect with your gifts, your skills, your talents, your creativity, and your uniqueness to really champion the life that you want. There's nothing that is impossible. There's nothing that you can't do. There's nothing that you can't accomplish. There's nothing that you can't have Is it going to be free?
No.
Is it going to be easy? No. Is it going to come at like a discount or on-sale price? No. It's going to cost you. It's going to cost you a lot, but you can do it. You can have it. I began my journey basically, uh, in 1995, speaking in jails and speaking in prisons, speaking in schools, colleges, speaking for corporate America. Speaking in basically every place that the door would open— churches, courtrooms, private sectors. Just last week here, as I mentioned, I was at the college in Kissimmee, but the Saturday before that, I was at a prison in Arcadia, Florida, speaking to inmates, talking to them about how not to give up on themselves. A couple days before that, I was in Tampa, Florida, speaking at a federal government conference to FBI agents, to agents that works in the Homeland Department, Department of Homeland Security, and even some out of the Oval Office. And a couple weeks before that, I was in New York speaking at a college camp, uh, college conference there, and talking about leadership. I get around, I speak a lot. I, I understand that there are some wonderful people in this world that got wonderful ideas and wonderful dreams, but sometimes just have a difficult time seeing those dreams and those ideas Come to fruition. And so I come along to just kind of help encourage you and empower you and motivate you and give you reasons to believe in yourself. Listen, I want to share a little bit about my personal life and where I get my motivation from. At the age of 13, I was a high school dropout. I dropped out of high school at the age of 13. I was in the 9th grade. I was a straight-A student and had some trouble at home. And things weren't like I wanted them to be. And I felt like I really needed to find a family elsewhere. So I ended up connecting with some guys in my school that were doing some things that were not so pleasant. I didn't realize it at the time. What I did realize is that they had a lot of money. They were flashy. The girls wanted to be with them. The guys wanted to be like them. And apparently I wanted to feel like I could have what they have and do what they did. And I ran away from home thinking I'm gonna go and live with them and start a family somewhere else. It was the worst mistake of my life. I found myself homeless at the age of 13. I found myself addicted to drugs at the age of 13, and I found myself engaged in criminal activity at the age of 13. So from the age of 13 to the age of 19, my life was about living in the streets, doing drugs, selling drugs, committing crimes, and being arrested. And that's what my life was from the age of 13 to the age of 19. I'm 53 years old now, so that was a long, long, long time ago. It was during that time that I realized that there's something different, something special, something unique about me, and I need to begin to discover that. And so while incarcerated, while in prison for the 3rd time, I began to focus internally and I discovered interpersonally that there is a whole nother person inside of me. There's a whole nother being inside of me. And while everyone else in prison was using their money to gamble and to buy Doritos and Little Debbie snack cakes, I used my commissary money that was supposed to be for deodorant and Little Debbie snack cakes, I used it to buy books. I found a guy named Billy in my prison dorm who had his own personal library. Older gentleman, he's never going home, and he wanted cigarettes and he wanted coffee. And I made a deal with him that I would buy his library. I would buy his books from him.
Wow.
So I took, every time I got money from my family, I would run to Billy and buy an encyclopedia. I would run back to Billy and buy a dictionary. I would run back to Billy and buy a Bible and buy a commentary. I would run back to Billy and buy an almanac. And when I bought these books, I would run back to my dorm or back to my bunk, and I would turn my bunk into a school. And for years I sat there 8 hours, 10 hours a day reading and studying, memorizing scriptures, memorizing, uh, words from out of the dictionary, memorizing as much as I could to self-educate myself. And so when I finally got released a couple of years later, I decided I'm no longer going back to that street life. I wanted to start a family and, and start a business and start giving back to society. And so the first thing that I did is I went back to the streets where I came from, and I started speaking to the young people out on the streets that were there with me before I went to prison, telling telling them there's a better way to life. And I started inviting them to come to church. I started inviting them to come to my house, and I had these little home studies where I would talk about things that were pertaining to life. And eventually they started following me. And then eventually one thing led to another. I started getting calls from county government, state government, federal government saying, hey, can you come talk to, to these inmates? Can you come talk to our, our students? You know, speaking of schools, can you come talk to our students? Can you come to the colleges and talk? And I said, yes, yes, yes, this is, this is what I want to do. This is who I am. This is what I live for. I feel like I'm giving back, I'm making a difference, and I'm helping people. And at that particular point, that's how my life began to evolve. I, I became a pastor, grew a church from my home to 3,000 members. I started a worldwide television show with multiple locations. I started my own business with property investment. I started traveling the world speaking to people. And here I am, here I am since 1995 to 2024. I'm still speaking and pouring my heart out to help people to understand that you can overcome, you can win in life. And so it's important that you, that you, you hear my story because the reason I share that is because I want you to understand that if Rico can overcome, if Rico can win, if Rico can bounce back from being that street guy who went to prison and got his life together, if I can make something of my life, If I can make something of the mess that I was in, then surely you can too.
All right?
Say this with me: If Rico can do it, Rico can do it. I can do it too. I can do it too. Come on, say it like you mean it. If Rico can do it, if Rico can do it, I can do it too. I can do it too. Now, it's important.
