The Resilient Mind - How to Unlock Your Greatness - Les Brown

Episode Date: April 11, 2023

Les Brown is a dynamic personality and highly-sought-after resource in business and professional circles for Fortune 500 CEOs, small business owners, non-profit and community leaders from all sectors of society looking to expand opportunity. Take action and strengthen your mind with The Resilient Mind Journal. Get your free digital copy today: ⁠⁠⁠⁠Download Now⁠⁠  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Resilient Mind podcast. In this episode, you will be listening to How to Unlock Your Greatness with Les Brown. Get access to the Mental Mastery Program and other exclusive episodes by becoming a subscriber. Enjoy. I like to talk with you this evening about being hungry. Somebody said, I'm hungry. It is something I like to share. share some ideas and thoughts with you. I'm not asking that you believe anything that I say.

I'm not asking that you agree with me. I'm merely asking that you stand on and end the conversation that we'll share with you this evening. And if there's something that I say that can fit and work for you, I say use it. If not, discarded and let it be. Is that all right? Say, that's fair enough. Very good. All right. One of the things I have realized and many of us have, that if you want something out of life, if you want to change yourself, if you want to acquire something, if there's some goal that you want to reach, that it's really not easy as some people will make us feel. That living your dream, changing your behaviors, overcoming negative habits, it's challenging.

it's hard that living alone is just very difficult and once we begin to come to grips with the fact that living is difficult life is very challenging I heard a song once by a guy named Dimples call

if it ain't one thing it's another I say to you if it ain't one thing it's 12 others always something you will never ever have a problem-free moment in life somebody said and I like this that you either in a problem or just left one or hit it toward one.

Anybody found that to be so raise your hand if you know what I'm talking about? I mean, there's always something. So how do we begin to nurture that hunger? What are the characteristics or the qualities of people that are hungry? What will it take for me to get some of the things that I want? And being hungry for those things. Number one, you've got to work on yourself. It's very important that you engage in an ongoing problem.

to develop you. Spend more time on yourself than what you've been spending. It's very important. You owe that to yourself. I was reading a book by Aug Mandino called the University of Success, read one line, gave me a chill. I didn't have to read anything else in the book. He said many of us never realize our greatness because we become sidetracked by secondary activity. We spread ourselves too thin. Don't know how to say no. And we find ourselves doing all kinds of things and never ever have time to do those things that we need to do to work on ourselves. And then there goes a second. That goes another second.

There goes another second. And we can't stop and hold time. And before you know it, you wake up one day and you're behind in your dreams and your bills. So decide that you're going to take some time to work on you, that you deserve that from yourself, that your life deserves some prime time because you are creating your own. production, as Michael Todd would say. You are the star of your show, you are the director, you're writing the script, and you will determine whether your life is a smash office hit or flop. You determine that. Working on yourself, talking to yourself. That's so very important. Overcoming the

negative conversation, that inner dialogue is going on all the time, all the time, even when you don't want it to be there. You can't stop yourself right now from thinking. You can't do it. It's going on. And so learning how to empower yourself. Part of doing that is standing up to yourself. You've got to stand up inside yourself sometimes and say, shut up. Do this. I was going to give a presentation. And this voice inside of me saying, you can't do this. You don't have everything it takes. I shut up. I have behind on my bills and you're telling me what I can't do. I have got to do it. Scared sometimes. Your mind will go blank on you. Some people you will allow to unnerve you and you wonder what's wrong with me? I'm not crazy.

That's why you've got to learn to make a conscious, deliberate, determine effort to stand up inside yourself. Working on yourself, watching that inner dialogue, it will determine the quality of your life. I don't believe this. I know this. I've had a challenge of losing weight. I'm walking through the airport this voice, say, why don't you have some eminent peanuts? No. Well, just one. Then after you eat that, you might as well have a sticker now, you sucker. I mean, it's challenging. My mother fixed a kind of sweet potato pie you can't eat with your shoes on. Have to take your shoes off so you can wiggle your toes. It sticks on my fingers. It says, eat it. One little bite won't hurt. That voice constantly, little demons from Colonel Sanders

driving my car in there. I had to say, no, no, no, no. I'll die you tomorrow. I saw a skinny man get hit by a truck. Had to have a little bit more way he might have lived. Some of you know what I'm talking about. Raise your head if you don't have. That voice is awesome. So you have got to stand up to that voice. When you're working on something you want to achieve. You have got to stand up to that voice. You've got to sell yourself every day on your abilities, on what you're doing, on the goal that you want to reach. You've got to sell yourself every day, every day, every day. According to your level of belief, it will manifest itself in what you're doing. Whatever we have right now, whatever we're demonstrating in our lives,

is a result of what we believe subconsciously that we deserve. And part of increasing that belief level is that you have got to convince yourself every day. You've got to sell yourself. I do a lot of training for many corporations, and I conduct sales seminars, and I've heard all kinds of guys doing techniques and training people techniques of how to close sales

and how to work with and begin to control the sale and how to ask for the clothes. Let me share something with you. You can learn all the techniques in the world. If you don't believe in yourself, it won't happen for you. I learn all of it. So that's why I do a training called Focus on the Seller. You've got to focus on you.

And as you convince you, as you sell yourself, every day, every day, every day, you will begin to see a difference in the things that you're doing. Selling yourself on your ability to perform a job, to achieve a certain objective, telling yourself every day, here I go again, and I got what it takes. This is my day, and nothing out here is going to stop me. And when you go out there, I say, come over here. Say it again. Well, I'll be back tomorrow.

That brings me to the next thing. It takes courage to act. Part of being hungry, when you've been defeated, it takes courage. to start over again. I used to do door-to-door sales, and I was working with another friend of mine, and door-to-door sales, I mean, it's punishing. It's cruel and unusual punishment.

And I was a little boy knocking on door. Hello, would you like to buy a nice working television set, no money down? No! Bam! They slammed the door on your face. And the friend of mine that was working with me, they slammed the door in his face,

and I looked back and he was going to the car. He said, I can't do this. And he sat down in the car, and he said, you go ahead, I'll be here when you get back. Now, he had a mother and father to take care of him. My mother was ill. I am adopted. I was hungry.

I had to go on. I learned something about myself. That when you step into your fears, somebody said, it was Winston Churchill. He said that courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm. You step into your fears and continue to push yourself, to go on, something happens for you.

It will enable you to transcend yourself. I went to the next door. You like to buy a nice working tell. No, bam. Went to the next door. No, bam. After a while, I no longer took it personal. And I begin to play a game.

I say, well, I know there's a yes. out here somewhere and I'm going to keep on till I find it and I'm not going home until I do and I continue to knock on doors and then somebody eventually would say yes and I said are you sure and I would go in there and I would get the sale when you when you have something you want to do if you don't develop the courage to do that which has been given you to do and you spend a lot of time going around trying to convince other people are trying to get their approval, what will happen is that you will lose your nerve and other people will convince you that what you're doing doesn't have any value and you'll give up on your dream. It's an interesting thing about life I've also found

that if you don't have the courage to act, sometimes and particularly if you have something special to do, life will move on you. If it were not for life, I would say, I would say, still be a disc jockey. I didn't just leave voluntarily to go to the state legislature. I was fired. I was working on a job, and I came home one day. I was married at the time, and I told my former wife, I said, that guy bird I worked for is stupid. She said, if he's so stupid, why does he sign you a paycheck? Now, you see why I divorced her, right? I couldn't stand her. That night, I could not sleep well. Here was a guy that was controlling my life. And I was, I was going through all kind of changes because this man controlled my paycheck.

And it was Carlisle who said, truth crushed to earth shall rise again. Winston Churchill said the truth is incontrovertible, malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but at the end there it is. And we know scripture that says, ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. And the truth that I had to come to grips with, that I wasn't in charge of my destiny. The truth was that I wasn't giving all that I had. The truth was that there are some things that I wanted to do, but I didn't have the courage to act on those things. And the truth was that Burchard was a blessing to me. He made life so miserable for me, I had to start looking at my life differently.

I started going to work earlier. I started being the last one to leave there. I started working harder than anybody else. The other guys could not. Why would you work so hard less? I said, I'm not working for them. I have been cheating, Bert, I thought. I've been cheating myself and my family,

wherever you are, whatever you're doing. Do it with everything that you have. Develop the habit of giving more than what you're paid for. Develop the habit of setting standards that others will be measured by. Someone said, do not go where the path may lead, but go where there's no path and leave a trail. All right? It is easy to be negative today. It is easy to have low morale today.

I was at a corporation and they're going through downsizing and going to lay off some 1,500 people over the next few weeks. It's very depressing there. And those people that stay there nine times out of 10, they're just going to do just enough to keep from getting fired. Anybody can do that. But if you can begin to harness yourself and say that where I am, I'm going to do the best I can with what I got because that is an expression of who I am. If you get into the habit of just being mediocre, it will become a part of your consciousness. If you get in a habit of giving less than what you have it within you to give, it will begin to reflect itself in your personality. it will begin to damage you psychologically.

And you don't want to be a part of that kind of self-destructive behavior. And so you want to set some high standards for yourself. The next thing, part of what feeds that hunger, you've got to develop a sense of urgency. Aurelia said, stop living your life like you have a thousand years to live. In life, you either hit a day and you're gone today. If there's something that you want to do and you can't do it all at one time, do just a little bit of it. I like what Rob O'Suller says. He said, by the yard it's hard, but inch by inch, anything is a cinch.

Do just a little bit of it. A friend of mine, Bobby Kerr, used to be a roommate. Bobby wanted to go into the area of public relations. He loved working with the public. Young lady, he wanted to marry named Clarice. Bobby was a great procrastinator. Pretty soon the job where Bobby worked, they transferred him to another location. He went out to celebrate with the people on that new job site.

And Bobby suffered a massive heart attack and died. Bobby didn't drink and didn't spoke. Was under 40 and he died. Ask your question, how much time do you have left? How much time do you have left? When you start thinking about that, we don't know. We don't know. Bobby took all the greatness and all of the talent and all of his abilities to his grave with him.

One of the things he could have put in parenthesis under his name, he didn't use all his stuff. Most of us do that. Most of us don't use the stuff that we have brought into the universe. And we want to make a conscious, deliberate, determine effort to start living life with a sense of urgency and using what we've got. using ourselves up, sharing what we brought into the universe to share, because if we don't, nobody else will, stop wasting valuable time, knowing that if we begin to live our lives as if each day were our last, our lives will take on a whole new meaning, take on a whole new expression, valuing each moment that we are blessed with. The next thing that begins to nurture that hunger, honor yourself as your word. Don't give your word out lightly.

When you throw your word out there and you don't honor it, it makes a statement about you. If you decide to maintain a sense of integrity with yourself that if I speak it, I'm going to live it. it's who I am and I'm going to be very cautious in how I give my word to others and most of all with the commitments that I make to myself because I want my life to reflect my words

and honoring who I am and what I express. Another challenging area in terms of nurturing and developing that hunger in yourself is learning the art of becoming single-minded learning how to concentrate, learning how to focus in, and you'll be surprised of the things that you're able to do. When you learn how to block things out, when you learn how to keep thy eyes single, you'll be surprised of the ideas that will come to you, of the people that you'll be able to attract, of the opportunities that you'll be able to see. You begin to see things that have been staring there looking you in the face, say, I can't believe this has been here. all this time.

Here's a habit that I do. Maybe it might be some value to you. I get up in the morning and I start writing what great ideas that I can think of today that can improve me and that will enable me to reach my goal. And I just let my mind flow. Sometimes I write 15, 20 ideas. Some days it's more difficult than others. One idea can change your life. one idea can turn your life around.

Deciding that you're going to focus to develop your skills. The guy was the new owner of a team, a baseball team that was in the basement of the league when he took it over. He went to the pitcher and he said, what is your best throat? He said, well, I got a good curveball and I've got a good fastball. And he went on talking about his different throws. He said, but tell me this, what is your best throat? He thought for a moment, he said, I've got a good fastball. He said, that's all I want you to work on.

Nothing else. Just develop your fastball. The next year, they went to the World Series. Most people don't know where their fastball is. Most people go through life never discovering what their talents are. Most people never develop their talents. They have skills and abilities, but if you don't nurture them, If you don't develop them, they will never serve you.

Your gifts can take you many places if you develop your gifts. Most of us don't like to do those things that come easy to us. I've always loved to talk to people. I decided taking this advice to develop my skills as a speaker and my gift has developed and has taken me many places. You have something that you brought to the universe and that if you decide that my gift My life deserves my developing this is what I do well.

And becoming the best at it and mastering myself and seeing what I have within me, if you decide to drop your buckets where you are and develop your gifts, I grant you you will never ever be without. I grant you that your gifts will take you places that will literally amaze you. I grant you that if you begin to work, to develop you, your gifts, you develop a strong sense of happiness, you'll get a larger vision of yourself, because part of beginning to get a larger vision of yourself,

all of us need some area of our lives where we can have a feeling of competence. That people know when they think about this area, that's something you do. That you eat and sleep that, and that you do that, you do that, and people know it, and you know it, and you know that you know this, If you don't know anything else, you know this.

Can you tell I know I know what I'm doing? Oh, hello. You know this. So you've got to work on it. When other folk are having a good time, you've got to have the strength of character to concentrate, to read, to digest information. If you decide in any particular area that you're concerned about,

to make a conscious, deliberate, determine effort to read one book, a month in that area, in five years you'll be among the top 5% experts in the world. I read a minimum of two books a week. The average American reads only one book a year. If you decide that area that you love, that you are going to master that particular area, in this era of accelerated change, overwhelming complexity, and tremendous competition, as you begin to develop and expand your skills and your talents and your vision of yourself, you will always be in control of your destiny. The next thing is, whatever it is that you want to do, you want

to do it massively. Have a friend who was telling me that his sales were down. I said, well, how many phone calls you make a day? He said, 25. I said, double them. Make 50 or or 100. He said, oh, man, that's just too much. What do you mean too much? You're behind on your bills? You're talking about too much? You know one way to get back on your feet real quick is to miss two car payments? You're talking about your tie? There's no competition out here. Decide that you're going to push yourself. Most people won't do that. Most people give up on themselves easily. You know the human spirit is powerful? There's not. Nothing is powerful. It's hard to kill the human spirit. They asked Benjamin Disraeli, a man who became the head of a country at the time when Jews were not allowed out after 10 o'clock, they said, how did you do it? How do you achieve against such great arts? He said, nothing can resist the will of a people that will stake even their existence on the extent of their purpose for good. that when you have a made-up mind,

when you decide that you want to do something, I was reading something the other day, he said, the power to hold on in spite of everything, the power to endure, this is the winner's quality, the hunger, the ability to face defeat again and again without giving up. This is a winner's quality. You have that quality within you.

When you're hungry, you don't care about the facts. You don't care about the odds. Doug Williams played for the Washington Redskins, quarterback, John Elway of the Denver Broncos and the Super Bowl. Everybody was talking about Elway, Elway. After the Super Bowl, when Doug Williams made a historic passing game, asked him, said, how were you able, in spite of all of the negative publicity saying that you couldn't win?

How did you do it? He said, I ignored my critics. I just didn't pay any attention to them. I ignored myself because they kept on saying it so much. There were times I doubted whether or not I can do what I needed to do. There's a Doug Williams and everybody here. There's greatness in you. And you've got to learn how to tune out the critics outside and the critic inside.

And since I'm going to do this, I'm going to honest my will, and I'm not going to let anything stop me. I deserve this. I'm going to do it until. And this friend I told him, said, start increasing your calls. I say, I make a hundred calls a day. I've got a callous in my ear. My ear is kind of dark.

You can't see it. But it's there. His sales have increased. He's working harder now. The other thing is that if you want something, you have got to be relentless. You've got to learn how to become resourceful. You've got to learn how to become creative. When crises strike in your life.

And in a Chinese language, crisis means danger, but it also means opportunity. And this is an opportunity for you to grow. And you've got to be so relentless, regardless of what comes down the pike, that you're always looking for a way to get over, always looking for a way, that you can break through, always looking for a way, that you can win, always looking for a way, that you can strike a telling blow. And pretty soon, I think there's some people watching us in the universe to say, wait, let's call a meeting over here.

you know that guy must stop and look at him down there he won't stop just that fool oh no he can't get over look look look here why don't we do this let him go and let's mess with somebody else just let him go on through life will just get tired of whipping you sometimes and just say let's just let this one go I believe this now nobody's told me this but I just kept on kicking I didn't have sense enough to stop I was intelligently ignorant. I didn't know what I couldn't do. So I just tried anything. And the fascinating thing about life,

because you can't get out of it alive, you might as well have a good time, you know. You might as well have a good time. Live your life with passion, with some drive. I was giving a seminar the other day, and I mentioned that I was going to do some time. training in August with some young teenagers and take about a hundred away

to a two or three day camp and wipe them out. I've been working on this. So after the speech one of the parents walked up to me and said Mr. Brown I'd like for you to do something for my son. He's not motivated. I said I wonder

why. I wonder what's wrong with him. He had no fire whatsoever. See, what you do speak so loudly folk can't hear what you're saying. And so if you don't have any fire, you know, you've got to watch the people, the relationships that you develop, have people of kindred mindsets. If you're around folk who are dead and negative all the time, they will affect you. You want people that around you that have smiles on their faces, looking good.

I was telling a group last week, Abraham Lincoln refused to hire guy because of his face. It said, but the guy can't help it. He said, anybody over 30 is responsible for you. for their face. If you have some depressing face looking at you every day, it affects your blood pressure. Keep these dead faces away from you. It's contagious.

This is serious. So you've got to watch your continence, watch your face, have an uplifted expression, watch your body posture. All of these things affect you psychically. You've got to be the kind of person that you are fearless. Fearless, folk leave fearless people alone. There's some people walk through a neighborhood and every dog in the neighborhood would balk at them.

But there's some people come through, there ain't nobody gonna mess with this. You are unstoppable. And because you are unstoppable, because you've got power that you haven't even begin to use yet, you ought to yourself to release your breaks. How many of you have the experience pulling out of your driveway and you're mashed on the accelerator and the car was just going,

it couldn't move, and you mashed hard and it couldn't move. And then you discovered you had your emergency brakes on. And then you release those emergency brakes and it goes, chew. Have you ever had that experience before? Most of us go through life with our brakes on, holding back, not giving all that we have, not sharing all of ourselves. Most of us go to our graves still holding on. Rather than releasing it, what are some of those things that keep us from releasing it?

Because of past experiences, past defeats, past pain. We look back, well, it didn't work out then. It probably won't work out now. Many people get confused their performances with who they are. I was reading Pat Riley, the coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. but you're going to like this quote here. After the trailblazers had blown them out of the water, and I'm sure he said this last night, they ask him,

how do you feel? He said, tonight we were exposed for what we are right now. You see? That if my speech tonight doesn't work, it doesn't mean that I'm a bad speaker. It means that what I did didn't work tonight. And I've got to separate what I do, from who I am, and I've got another shot.

See, the last chapter to your life has not been written yet, and it doesn't matter about what happened yesterday. It doesn't matter about the things that you've done that you feel guilty about. If you wouldn't do it today, you're convicting an innocent person. You've been reborn to a new state of consciousness. And as they say, if we knew better, we would do better. And so you begin to decide.

I'm not going to be denied. I remember and I was telling someone and they asked me, would you repeat that again? I was interested in going into broadcasting. I'm adopted. And that was my key out. I wanted to make my mama proud of me. I was very much appreciative of what she's done

for my brother and sister and I. And that was my way out. And I went over to a radio station and asked a guy and told him that I was interested in broadcasting. He looked at me in my straw hat and my overalls. He said, you have any broadcasting? Background, I said, no, sir, I don't.

What do you do? I cut grass. Young ladies asked me what kind of work I do, and I was working on the garbage truck. I said, well, I'm a sanitary technician. He said, we don't have any job for you. I decided that that was something I was going to do. I decided I'm unstoppable. I'm going to go up and hit. I'm going to do this.

I started going to the radio station every day. developing a relationship with the people that were doing what I wanted to do. And that's what I encourage you to do. Whatever area you want to go and find people that are doing it, the way you want to do it, and develop a relationship with them. When I decided to go in this area, I wrote letters to Dr. Norman Vincent Peel, to Zig Zigla, to Dennis Waitley, all of the giants in this area, and I said, this is something I want to do.

I've been following your career. Would you help me? Dr. Norman Vincent Peel answered my letter, did an article on me, He wrote about me in the most recent book that he issued and done many broadcasts about me. I'd wanted to develop a relationship and rapport with those people that were achieving those things that I wanted to achieve. By the same token, I would go to the radio station, and I developed a relationship with the guys. And they used me as the errand board, and they needed some food or someone to go pick up entertainers that came in a town. Temptation singing, My Girl, Jerry Butler, singing for Your Precious Love, Sam Cook singing,

darling you send me I would pick up the entertainers at the airport and driving around in the disc jockeys big Cadillacs didn't have any driver's license but I was acting like I had some all day I used to go home and work on my communication skills developing myself it was Whitney Young he said it's better to be prepared for an opportunity and not have one than to have an opportunity and not be prepared start working and developing yourself now and prepare yourself for what it is that you want because you expect to get it. And when the disc jockeys were in the control room, I would go in and watch them and develop the trust level and they would let me stay and I would watch and observe them working the controls. When you want

something out of life, don't worry about how you're going to get it. How is none of your business? The most difficult thing that it is, is to hold the vision. It's to hold the vision. So there I was at the radio station. A guy was on the air and he started to try. drink. By the name of Rock, I was outside the window looking at him and watching. Hungry! Saying drink, rock drink. Pretty soon the phone rang. It was a general manager. I said, hello. He said, less, this is Mr. Klein. I said, I know. He said, Rock can't finish his program. He's slurring his words. I said, I know.

Can you work the controls until one of the other disc jockeys come in? Would you call them? I said, yes, sir. I hung the phone off. I said, now he must be thinking I'm crazy. I called my mom and my girlfriend, Cassandra, said, y'all come out on the front porch and turn up the radio. I'm about to come on the air. I waited about 15 minutes.

I called him back. I said, Mr. Klein, I can't find nobody. He said, well, why don't you go in there working controls until they get there? And don't say nothing here. I said, yes, sir. I couldn't wait to sit down to that turntable. Mustafa. I said, look out, this is me, LB, triple P, Lest Brony, a platter, plan, Papa.

There were none before me and there will be none after me. Therefore, that makes me to one and only. Young and single and love to Manga, certified, bona fide, then duplably qualified to bring you satisfaction and a whole out of action. Look out, baby. I'm your loved man. I was hungry. Shake somebody's hand on your right and left and say, you've got to be hungry.

Where are you on something else? You have me? You want to be persistent about what it is that you want to achieve. Alexander Graham Bell said, what this power is, I cannot say. All I know is that it exists and it becomes available only when a man or a woman is in that state of mind in which he or she knows exactly what he or she wants and is fully determined not to quit until they find it. When our children are learning how to walk, how many times will your baby attempt to walk and fall and you just say, just sit down. Don't try anymore. You've fallen 20 times. Just sit down somewhere. Busting your lip and everything, getting in folks' way. When will a baby walk? It will walk when it walks.

That's when it will walk. Less when will you be known nationally as the motivator. I will be known when I'm known. That's when I'll be known. Don't get caught up in, well, I've tried it four or five times and things didn't work out. If there's something that you want and you'll hungry for it, you've got to do whatever is necessary until. And when you give the best you can and that's not enough, you must do what is required. And don't give up on yourself. Don't throw the towel in so quickly. Many people give up on the one yard line where if they have the determination just to keep on knocking. It's a funny thing about life. If you're home one day and someone is knocking on the door and you say, I don't want to be bothered today. And if that person just keep on knocking,

can you believe that fool's still knocking? Pretty soon you say, what is it? What do you want? And that's how you've got to be about your dream. Some people, well, I guess ain't nobody home. I knocked on the door, but nobody came. I heard the television on and people were moving around, but I guess the opportunity probably went out the back door.

Oh, no, no, no. See, life is not just that simple. It's not that cut and dry. And that's why most people never realize their personal greatness, because they're casual about life. And when you are casual about life, you will end up a casualty. Life is serious business. So I encourage you to be persistent, to not decide that, well, I've done the best I can't. I guess I just can't have it.

Don't make that decision. Many of us make premature decisions about ourselves. Calvin Coolidge said something, a man who was a president that was not known for his eloquence or making any historical decisions, but something he wrote about persistence. And he says, press on. Nothing can take the place of persistence. Talent will not. The world is full of unsuccessful people with talent.

genius will not unrewarded genius is almost a proverb education alone will not the world is full of educated derelicts persistence and determination alone are omnipotent there's a person that is the embodiment

of persistence and determination a person who decided that some time ago that I'm not going to take anything to my grave with me. I'm going to use myself up and I'm going to give and give and give until my last breath. This summer I'm going to be working for her and with her doing training, teaching young people techniques and strategies on how to manifest their personal greatness, teaching them techniques and strategies that will change them at the subconscious level,

changing their value systems and let them see the major role they can play in society. Let's give Mrs. Rosa Parks a round of applause. if you please. There we are in the presence of greatness. Mrs. Parks, people who couldn't see you would you come up? She's such a beautiful person. I encourage you to see Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Elaine Steele about the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. If you're interested in your children participating in that, they have some information over here to share with you. It is just fascinating and just a blessing to have this woman when a lot of folk who are giving up and here this year she

celebrated her 75th birthday and still has a dream of being an instrument of change. And there is a Rosa Parks and all of us who made a decision at one point in time, standing on the platform of oughtness, as Emmanuel Kant talks about in a book called critique of pure reasoning, that there's certain things we know we ought to do. We just know it. We owe it to ourselves and those around us. I don't know what your dreams are. I don't know what your goals are.

But let me leave this with you. Mine is to be the best son that I can to my mother. Mine is to be the best father that I can to my children. And to be the best servant that I can to humanity and the best man that I can to the woman that I've decided to share my life with. Whatever your goals are, I know that you can achieve them. Here's something that I like to leave with you.

It says simply that if you want to think, bad enough to go out and fight for it, to work day and night for it, to give up your time, your peace, and your sleep for it, if all that you dream and scheme is about it, and life seemed useless and worthless without it, and if you gladly sweat for it and fret for it, and plan for it, and lose all your terror of the opposition for it, and if you simply go out for that things that you want, with all of your capacity, strength and sagacity, faith, hope, and confidence, and stern pertinacity, if neither cold poverty, famish or gault, Sickness of pain of body and brain can keep you away from the thing that you want.

If dogged and grim you besieged it, with the help of God, you'll get it. This is Mrs. Mamie Brown's baby boy, Leslie Calvin Brown, saying it's been a plump-pleting pleasure as well as a privilege. Thank you all, dear. Thank you for tuning into this episode. If you're enjoying the content, you can access exclusive material by becoming a subscriber. Continue strengthening your mind by listening to our other episodes.