Motivated

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I went to one of those “cheesy billboard seminars”. One of those seminars that’s guaranteed to revolutionize your life in 24 hours or your money back…“It’s time to….”GET MOTIVATED!” Yeah, right... (I’m a natural skeptic). And the tickets were nearly free—but I darn well better get my $10 worth! I WAS super excited to see Colin Powell and Laura Bush—I think this is the universal sign of a true Toastmaster when you get your jollies watching other people speak. 

After sitting in traffic for what seemed like hours, fighting my way through security and metal detectors skillfully hiding my packed-in lunch and water bottle in my pants pockets… hey, a Staples Center McDonald’s breakfast set my friend back 20 bucks…. I’m really cheap! I ran down the stairs and nabbed a seat in the 3^rd row of the Staples Center. As soon as I saw the stage, my Toastmasters instincts kicked in. Staples center is home of the King’s hockey games—and the stage was set in the center of the arena! A 4-sided stage… oh no, I thought… a Toastmaster's nightmare. Someone will always be staring at the speaker’s butt! It’ll probably be me!

One of the earlier speakers, Mr. Krish Dhanam came to the stage. I was close enough to see he was really tall, and broad—built like a linebacker—surprising for an Indian dude. With dark, square glasses and a mustache he looked exactly like my mentor….who used to be an engineer. He starts his speech with an introduction… and a quote. “Maybe you thought I look like I should own a 7-11. Or be an engineer.” And the crowd laughs. 

And I’m captivated. He’s the epitome of a great speaker. Posture. Depth of voice. Great organization.

He works that 4-sided stage like a natural, speaking from corner to corner, moving with purpose around the room. He uses alliteration adroitly, and creates visuals vying for detailed description.  And his one liners…

“If you’re happy and you know it, …TELL YOUR FACE!!” 

He talks about authentic leadership. Learning to love each other. And 4 levels of communicating  he learned working for Zig Ziglar for over 20 years.I’m inspired. And I’m jealous as hell! And this feeling, the gnawing tightness of envy… is completely… un-motivating! Out of the jealousy and the comparison comes my critical voice. 

We all have one, don’t we? It’s that voice that tells me… quietly at first… you could never do that.

You’ll never be that compelling.Why do you even try? Criticizing my every move, every thought and every word… you’ll never be enough. It’s that inner dialogue, that inner critic… the things I would never, ever say to someone else, but somehow it’s ok to be that terrible to myself.  Wait a second, wait a second!!! That’s the entire point of Mr. Dhanam’s speech! He said, “We have mastered love, but we are miserable at being loved! There are 7 billion others on this planet during the time we’re here. Don’t kid ourselves that we’re not unique and designed for greatness.”

And my inner critic fell silent.

In her book, “Radical Acceptance” Tara Brach writes that there is a “trance of unworthiness” that all of us fall into. She says that “The belief that we are deficient and unworthy makes it difficult to trust that we are truly loved.” 

Even if we don’t yet know how to quiet our critical voice, we are ALL loved. In those moments we make a difference for someone else—with our words, our message from the front of the room. Our audience appreciates us and we make a difference—we are loved.In the quiet times with our spouses or families where the most important things can be said, and trusted confidences are shared—we are loved.

In the deepest, quiet places of our souls, when we stop, become still and quiet, in our hearts we know—we are loved, despite the inner critic, despite the noise of the world around us, despite the lies we believe about ourselves, at the core of our being we all know the truth—we are loved. And in that silent stillness of that loving place, our hearts can start to believe in our own potential.

And that idea is motivating!