Motivational talk by Alex Charfen asserting that being different is a strength: many people who changed the world were outsiders or had disabilities, and feeling alone or misfit is often a sign you are meant to make a significant contribution. Charfen’s stated legacy is to reassure people who feel different that they matter, are capable, and are here to change the world. The clip ends with a short YouTube outro from Josh Trent encouraging viewers to watch more videos.
Chapters
I was always a completely different kid. You know, I did not get along socially with other students. I didn't get along with most teachers. Thank God there was a few that saved my life. When I was a kid. I thought I was so fundamentally removed from this thing called success that I would never get there. And I started obsessing over the lives of successful people. Not just business people, but I read biographies and autobiographies and third party accounts and articles and like, what anything I could get my hands on to understand why there's certain people that we remember, there's certain people that matter to be remembered. And Josh, I thought I was going to go out and find this like, incredible specimen of a human being that was so much different than me. But what I found was the opposite. What I found was over and over again that the people who change the world are the people who are different than all of us. There's equation that this equation we have today in the world that if you don't look like everyone else, talk like everyone else, show up like everyone else and learn like everyone else, we need to diagnose you, medicate you, and fix you so you're just like everybody else. And history has proven without a shadow of a doubt there's no way you can make the opposite argument that the person who shows up different, who doesn't look like everyone else, talk like everyone else, walk like everyone else, learn like everyone else, is exactly the person who always changes the world. No exception. Helen Keller. Couldn't see, couldn't hear, couldn't, couldn't speak. Changed the world for disabled people. Thomas Edison was sent home at 5 years old cause he was too slow to go to school. Look what he did. Albert Einstein couldn't tie his shoes or remember his phone number and failed algebra and he's fucking Albert Einstein. And so the. The legacy I want to leave behind. Sorry, is for people like me who have been in that place where you feel like you're completely alone and you're a party of one and the entire world is against you and it doesn't work for you. And you either have to survive the system or game the system in order. The legacy I want to leave behind is that every person who's ever felt like that knows without a shadow of a doubt that not only do you matter, and not only are you capable, and not only were you put here to do something, but the fact that you're different from everyone else is exactly the message given you by the universe that you are here to change the world. You are here to make a massive contribution, and no one should tell you otherwise. And if you have ever felt that way and you're listening now, I want you to know something. History has proven that you are in exactly the right place. History has proven that you are here for a reason. And there is nothing wrong with you. And you are not alone. Because no matter what you're suffering through, no matter what you're dealing with, no matter what you've gone through in your life, somebody just like us has done the same and gone on to change the world. And you can, too. History has written it. This is not just me saying it. It's what we all need to believe. And if I can leave that behind, if I can leave that impression for everyone who's ever felt like I felt, that is my ultimate goal in the world.
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