00:00Oh great, another motivational spea...
00:03Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
00:05I kind of dislike that people refer to me as a motivational speaker
00:08because that means,
00:08Oh, let me guess, you're always positive, huh.
00:11Shut up.
00:12Laughter
00:14This is very funny to me.
00:16I don't know, like if you can see this from where you are,
00:18but there are people in the front row
00:21watching me on the screen.
00:25I'm right here!
00:27You clap, they're crying.
00:33Why did that little man yell at us?
00:36He is an angry elf.
00:38It's terrible.
00:41For me, my biological mom was 17 when she got pregnant with me.
00:45I know I like to joke.
00:46I'm not joking.
00:47On the day I was born, my mother left me at the hospital when I was born.
00:51What that means to you is that I'm an orphan.
00:52On my birth certificate, it says, Josh Shipp, orphan of the court slash ward of the state.
00:57I just have to say, Josh, welcome.
01:00Your life's probably going to be pretty messed up.
01:02Your life is now determined from this one unfortunate situation.
01:06I'm not saying everyone in this room has been left at the hospital.
01:09Obviously not.
01:10I'm not saying everyone had a difficult childhood.
01:12Obviously not.
01:13My point is, all of us in this room have had and will face challenges, things that are
01:18unfortunate.
01:19Sometimes things that we idiotically cause to ourselves.
01:23Sometimes things completely out of our control that people cause to us.
01:28By the time I was eight, I lived in a dozen different foster homes.
01:32One foster home, 15 kids lived there, ages five to 21.
01:36It was a place they stuck you while they figured out what we're going to do with this kid.
01:40There was a 21-year-old man who lived in that house, came into the room I was staying in,
01:45raped every kid in the room.
01:47As an eight-year-old in that instant, I made the decision.
01:49I hate myself.
01:50I hate my life.
01:51Screw it.
01:52I'm done.
01:53I was so angry, so defiant, because this one adult burned me, broke my trust.
01:58I thought, I can't trust anyone.
02:00I can't let anyone in.
02:01I don't want to ever get hurt and burned like that again.
02:03I medicated myself by eating food.
02:06That made me feel great.
02:07I was very short, got very overweight.
02:10Every day I would go to school, there was a new fat joke about me.
02:13One time a kid said to me, hey Josh, you're nothing but a stupid, fat, pathetic, punk
02:18foster kid.
02:20No wonder your mom left you at the hospital.
02:22But in that moment, I reacted like most people, you're an idiot, you don't know what you're
02:26talking about.
02:27But secretly, quietly, behind everyone's back, those words haunted me.
02:35And I would replay them.
02:36What if I am nothing but a stupid, fat, pathetic, punk foster kid?
02:42So what I did is I told no one.
02:44Here's the problem.
02:45What you do not talk out, you act out.
02:47You don't deal with it, it will deal with you.
02:49It's like that, you ever play Mario Brothers?
02:51Old school, hands up sharp.
02:53Hands down sharp.
02:55Remember Mario Brothers?
02:56There was, in certain levels, there would be the stupid ghost.
03:01I hate that dude.
03:04Think about the ghost in your mind as the challenges you will face, because that ghost
03:10would chase you, haunt you, chase you, until you did the following, which was turn around
03:16and face him.
03:17Only then would he stop.
03:18He would not go away, but only then would he stop.
03:21The same is true.
03:22You cannot run away from the challenges, from the circumstances, from the situations.
03:27You have to, even though anyone would be terrified to do such, you have to have the courage to
03:32turn around and face it.
03:35Some of you are believing that just because you've screwed up, that you are a screw up.
03:38Some of you are believing that just because you've failed, that you're a failure.
03:41Some of you are believing that just because you've had something terrible happen, that
03:45you are terrible.
03:46What if I am nothing but a loser, nothing but fat, nothing but a slut, nothing but pathetic?
03:51Cut that crap, stop listening to that.
03:53Your imperfections make you human.
03:55Your humanity makes you influential.
03:58Do not make someone's words a priority to you when all you are to them is an option.
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