Eric Thomas | Motivational Speech | How Bad Do you

[music fades in near beginning and
continues loudly throughout]

So if you wanna make six figures,

you can't just be talkin' about
you wanna make six figures.

You hear what I'm sayin' here tonight?

If you do the three things I tell you
to do tonight,

I guarantee you, whatever it is you wanna
do in life, you'll be able to do.

You will be able to accomplish whatever
you want to academically, financially,

relationally, whatever. So three things.

All right, I'm gonna tell you this story
and I gotta get outta here.

And the story is about, you guys have
probably heard about this before,

it was a young man who, y'know,
he wanted to make a lot of money,

and so he went to this guru, right?

He told the guru, "I wanna be on
the same level you are."

So the guru said, "If you wanna be on
the same level I'm on,

"I'll meet you tomorrow at the beach
at 4 a.m."

He's like, "The beach? I said I wanna
make money, I don't wanna swim."

Guru said, "If you wanna make money,
I'll meet you tomorrow. 4 a.m."

So the young man got there at 4 a.m.,
he all ready to rock and roll,

he got on a suit, shoulda worn shorts.
The old man grabs his hand and said,

"How bad do you wanna be successful?"
He said, "Real bad."

He said, "Walk on out in the water."
So he walks out into the water. Watch this.

When he walks out into the water,
he goes waist-deep.

So he like, "This guy crazy. I wanna
make money, he got me out here swimming.

"I didn't ask to be a life guard.
I wanna make money."

So he said, "Come out a little further."
Walked out a little further,

and he had it right around this area.
The shoulder area.

Said, "This old man crazy.
He makin' money, but he crazy."

Said, "Come on out a little further."
He came out a little further,

It was right at his mouth.
My man like,

"I'm 'bout to go back in here.
This guy's outta his mind."

So the old man said, "I thought you said
you wanted to be successful!"

He said, "I do."
He said, "Walk a little further."

He came, dropped his head in,
held him down, holding him down,

my man scratching, holdin' him down.

[Says something to man in class he's
actually holding down -- I got you.]

He had him held down -- I need you
for illustration -- he had him held down.

Just before my man was about to pass out,
he raised him up.

He said, "I got a question for you."
Somebody answer the question for me.

He said, "When you were underwater,
what did you wanna do?"

"Leave?" I'm lookin' for a different word,
brother. What's that word?

He said, "I wanted to breathe."

He told the guy, he said, "When you want
to succeed as bad as you want to breathe,

"then you'll be successful."

I don't know how many of you all
got asthma here today,

but if you ever had a asthma attack before,
you short of breath.

SOB. Shortness of Breath.
You wheezin'.

The only thing you trying to do
is get some air.

You don't care about no basketball game,

you don't care what's on TV, you don't
care about nobody calling you,

you don't care about a party.
The only thing you care about

when you trying to breathe
is to get some fresh air. That's it.

And when you get to the point where
all you wanna do is be successful,

as bad as you wanna breathe,
then you'll be successful.

And I'm here to tell you, number one, that
most of you say you wanna be successful,

but you don't want it bad.
You just kinda want it.

You don't want it badder
than you wanna party.

You don't want it as much as
you wanna be cool.

Most of you don't want success
as much as you wanna sleep!

Some of you love sleep
more than you love success.

And I'm here to tell you today,
if you're going to be successful,

you've gotta be willin' to give up sleep.

You've gotta be willin' to work offa
three hours of sleep, two hours.

If you really wanna be successful,
some day,

you'll have to stay up three days in a row.

Because if you go to sleep, you might
miss the opportunity to be successful.

That's how bad you gotta want it.

You gotta go days without -- listen to me.
You gotta wanna be successful so bad

that you forget to eat.

Beyonce said, once she was on the set,
doin' her thing, three days had gone by,

she forgot she didn't eat.
'Cause she was engaged.

I'll never forget, I went --
50 Cent was doin' his movie,

I did a little research on 50 --

and 50 said that when he wasn't doin'
the movie, he was doin' the soundtrack.

And they said, "When do you sleep, 50?"

He said, "Sleep is for those
people who are broke.

"I don't sleep."

He said, "I got a opportunity
to make a dream become a reality."

Football players --
how many football players?

Got anybody like football in here,
raise your hand, anybody like football?

Emmitt Smith. I used to be a Cowboys fan.
Before they did my boy Tom Landry wrong,

I used to be a Cowboys fan. And watch
this, there was a commercial.

Emmitt Smith had won his first Super Bowl,
and he had this commercial,

and he was liftin' weights.
I don't know if you saw the commercial.

He was liftin', and he said, Emmitt said,

"You know what? I won the Super Bowl,
so I can rest now."

He had been doin' his bench pressing.

So he said, "I won the Super Bowl,
so I can rest now."

So he throws on about 325, boom!
And he rests for about two seconds,

then he -- boom.

Boom.

Boom.

D'you see that?
He'd already won a Super Bowl.

He said, "I think I'm gonna take a rest,"
and he rests for how long? One second.

Most of you won't be successful because when
you studying and you get tired, you quit.

And I'm here to tell you today -- somebody
came to my office the other day crying.

I said, "Look, don't cry to give up.
Cry to keep going."

Don't cry to quit! You already in pain,
you already hurt. Get a reward from it!

Don't go to sleep until you succeed.
Listen to me.

I'm here to tell you today that you
can come here, you can jump up,

you can do flips, you can be excited when
we give away money, but listen to me,

you will never be successful until I don't
have to give you a dime to do what you do.

You won't be successful until you say,
"I don't need that money,

"'cause I got it in here."
So listen to me.

Emmitt Smith said this,
at the end of the commercial:

Emmitt Smith said, "All men are created
equal. Some work harder in pre-season."

Ima say it again because
you mighta missed it:

All men are created equal.
Some work harder in pre-season.

So that means that there are some people
who are goin' to see the professor,

goin' to see the TA,
and even when the professor says,

"I don't meet with you,
my TA meet with you,"

you say, "I don't wanna talk to your TA.
I don't pay the TA. I pay you to teach me.

"So you gonna have to find some time to
meet me. If I gotta meet you at the mall,

"if I gotta meet you at your house,
you are going to see me."

Listen to me. All men are created equal,
some work harder in pre-season.

When I went to college,
guys were way smarter than me.

4.0, 3.0, they went to the Ivy League
high schools,

came to Oakwood from great high schools.
Most of 'em are not doing what I'm doing.

Why? 'Cause it's not about
where you come from.

It's about heart.

You come to a place where
being smart ain't enough.

You gotta have heart. That's number one.
What's number two?

Number two, I wrote it down.
I wanted to make sure you got it.

It says, watch this, we're talkin'
about sacrifice now.

The important thing is this.
You're writin' while I'm sayin' it,

'cause I only have about three
more minutes. Listen to me.

The most important thing is this:

To be able, at any moment, to sacrifice
what you are for what you will become.

That's the number two thing.
You gotta catch that one.

To be able to -- listen to me.
At any moment, some of you --

you can make sacrifices when
Monday Night Football is not on.

You can make a sacrifice. But when
the game come on, for some reason,

you just attached to it. For some of you,
when your favorite show come on,

you can make sacrifices on Sunday
when ain't nothin' goin' on,

but when your favorite show
comes on Monday, bam.

Some of you,
you focus until the phone rings,

and you like, "I gotta answer it. If I
don't answer the phone, I'm gonna die."

I'm sayin' to you today
that there's some of you,

if you give up your cellphone,
you will be successful.

But your cellphone is more important
to you than your success.

Ima say it again. Ima hurt somebody.
Ima hurt somebody.

Some of you need to give up your cellphone
because the time you spend on your cellphone

could be used for your success. The time
you could be using to be successful,

you're using on the cell. The cellphone's
not bringin' you nothin' but a bill.

And somebody has told you,
you couldn't live without it.

I'm talkin' about goin' deep now.
Givin' up stuff. That's what it says.

To be able, at any moment, to sacrifice
what we are for what we could be.

I don't do well in math. You're right!
You ain't never studied!

I'm not good at writing!
'Cause you have never written before.

But I dare you to fail at writing
for a whole year,

to see if you can get to the end.

I dare you to fail. I dare you to take that
same class over and over again.

I dare you to stop droppin' classes,
like you soft.

Always want to give up. I'm dropping!
Why you droppin'?

I'm so grateful that the slaves
didn't drop and quit,

say, "I'm just gon' stop. I'm a slave,
I'm just gon' be a slave, Ima quit."

Listen to me. The slaves said, "We will
live, because one day we will become.

"We will always be slaves.
So today, although we're slaves,

"we gon' act like we free,
and one day our children will be free."

If the slaves woulda just said,
"We quit. We give up,"

we woulda died in the middle passage.

But some slaves said, "I don't care
what we go through, we gon' survive this."

400 years of slavery.
We gon' get through this.

And you can't get through a 1825.

You can't get through a writing class,
and you got tutor after tutor,

resource after resource. The problem is,
you ain't never felt no pain before.

You're soft. This is a soft generation.
You quit on everything.

Our people did not quit.

Harriet Tubman not only made it,
she went back and got some more.

She said, "You know what? I'm gon' walk all
-- listen to me, shh -- not ride the bus,

I'm gon' walk all the way back down to
the South to get some more."

And you quittin' on 1825?

Now watch this. You quit after you
-- listen to me, you get a sleeping bag

and you wait for him. You wait for the
first WIA instructor to come in,

and you come outta your sleeping bag,
"I need help."

You quit after you do that.

You quit after you had, listen to me,
a WIA party.

I'm havin' a party, everybody come over.
I got food. That's it.

And let 'em get over there, let it be
all the best writers.

All right, I fooled y'all.
I wanna have a writing party.

[class laughs]

I'm serious.

You quittin' and you ain't even
tried yet. Last one, I'm sorry.

Last one. Listen to me.
Pain is temporary.

It may last for a minute, or an hour,
or a day, or even a year,

but eventually it will subside,

and something else will take its place.

If I quit, however, it will last forever.

Listen to me, I'm tellin' you as I leave.

Tellin' you as I leave, I was homeless
for two and a half years,

and the problem with most of you is you
never felt no pain before. Y'all spoiled.

Y'all spoiled. Some of you all spoiled.
It's the bottom line.

Your parents have done everything for you.

You never had to do nothin' for yourself.
You spoiled. We gonna keep it real tonight.

Some of you are spoiled brats.

Every time you ever got in trouble,
somebody in your house got you out of it.

Every time you done something
you not supposed to do --

People say, "Eric, your mother's
a tyrant." You're right!

She kicked me out. You're right.
She mean. But she developed a man,

because she put me out there and said,
"You gonna have to grow up."

And some of you have never
learned to grow up,

and so every time somethin' get hard,
you quit. You call Momma.

I dare you to take a little pain.

I dare you.

I dare you not to go home.

Somebody said, "I gotta go home,
I feel bad."

Go through it!

You ain't gonna die.
At the end of pain is success.

You're not gonna die
because you feelin' a little pain.

I'm not eatin' like I eat at home.

That's why you're about to go through
the next level,

'cause if you keep eatin' like you ate at
home, you'll keep being a boy or girl.

It's time to become man, woman.

So don't worry about a little pain.

My greatest asset is,
I was homeless,

so I can't feel a whole lot of pain.
I've already been alone.

There's not a whole lot of hurt I can feel
on a little paper, or a little test.

So I leave you, listen to me,
we have gotten to a point

where it's midterms,
and we movin' forward.

The days of you gettin' money
-- I'm not sayin' we quittin',

but I'm sayin' the day has gotta go
from external to internal.

You have to give it everything you got.
No more TV. No more parties.

No more playin'. If you don't have a 4.0,
what you need to be doin' is studying.

Get off the phone! Sorry, I'm not
available until the end of this year.

[class laughs]
No, I'm for real!

You've reached the right number,
but you called me at the wrong time.

Call me back January 1st.

I'm about to get busy now.

Huh? I want you to
have a countdown of your own,

and say when the countdown is over --
Shh, watch me, 'cause when I was homeless

I knew somethin' was wrong,
I knew that wasn't the best of me,

and one day I said, "Will the real
Eric Thomas please stand up?"

Will the real Eric Thomas please stand up?

Stop bein' this high school dropout.
Stop givin' up.

Stop sleepin' on the street.

Stop walkin' up and down [?] Avenue
like you ain't got nothin',

and get your GED.
Stop bein' afraid to take a test.

Stop bein' afraid to go to college
'cause your Daddy didn't go,

and your Momma didn't go.
Stop bein' afraid,

and be the best Eric Thomas you can be.

But listen to me, it's gon' be hard.

It took me 12 years to get a 4-year degree,
but I got it, and guess what?

On a degree, it don't have dates.

So if it took you 4 and it took me
12, it don't show up nowhere.

But I'm exactly where I wanted to be,
because I realized

I gotta commit my very being to this day.

I gotta breathe it, I gotta eat it,
I gotta sleep it.

And until you get there, you will
never be successful in life.

But once you get there, I guarantee you,
the world is yours.

So work hard, and you can have
whatever it is you want.

Thank you guys for your time.
[applause]