So today, I have three stories to share with you,
and each of them have to do with scouting.
My experiences in scouting.
But, you won't necessarily see
how they connect with scouting at the very beginning.
So, here are the three stories.
The first story, is going to be about juggling, okay?
The second story, is going to be about
overcoming obstacles in life.
And you're wondering why I'm carrying this stuffed animal.
You'll know, in a second.
And the third story, is about electronic gadgets, okay?
So, those are the three stories.
So, my question, to begin,
is how many of you in the room,
this goes for adults, this goes for scouts,
this goes for those, who are in the program,
not in the program.
How many of you have attempted to juggle before?
Have you tried?
And how many have been fairly successful?
Who's a really good juggler?
- Maybe a couple, maybe a couple.
Iffy, iffy.
Well, guess what?
When I was younger than everyone on this row,
I was four or five,
I went to a birthday party,
and I saw a clown juggling three objects in the air
and I said, I have to do that!
I really wanted to know how to juggle, right?
So, I saw these objects moving.
They were falling, like this.
They were inter-crossing, and going like this,
and I'm like, how on Earth does that work?
So, I went home, I didn't have a set
of juggling balls to my name,
but I did have some tennis balls,
I did have some rocks at home in the driveway,
and what I did, was I tried.
So, I pick up three objects,
and I'm like, I wanna know how to juggle.
I wanna be a really good juggler.
So, this is what I'm gonna do.
I'm gonna toss it into the air, and this,
what is about to happen, is what it looked like.
Okay, ready?
This may be a common experience for everyone
who's tried to juggle.
I said, I'm gonna be a juggler.
And next thing I know they're on the floor.
And do you know what I told myself, for two seconds?
I was like, maybe I'm not cut out to be a juggler.
Maybe I'm not that good at it.
Maybe it's really difficult.
Shouldn't it be easier than this?
And I found out, that the more I dropped,
the longer I could juggle.
So, here's what happened.
It went from one juggling ball...
To two...
To three.
Now, remember, I dropped a lot on the way, okay?
It wasn't a pure process,
where it's like, all of a sudden, a juggler.
So, here's how it works.
I started practicing, I dropped.
I started practicing, I went a little longer, and I dropped.
I started going from a high pattern,
to a tight, low pattern.
My throws became more consistent.
The next thing I know...
(people exclaiming and clapping)
I became a little better!
I went, from telling myself,
wow, you have no talent.
You're not talented, in this juggling area,
And I became a totally talentless juggler.
The fact was, it wasn't that I didn't have talent,
it's that I had the ability,
I just had to keep going, right?
And that applies to lots of things in life.
I said, well that's not enough!
If I'm gonna be a real juggler,
I'm not just gonna stop with three.
Why stop with three, if I did three, right?
So I said okay, how does this work?
I can do two, in one hand.
I can do two like this,
two like this,
clockwise, counter-clockwise, in columns.
Why can't I do that in the left hand too?
Doesn't that make four?
Of course it makes four.
Next thing I know, I'm trying things like this.
And there we are, we went from three,
not having any talent in the world,
to four juggling balls by practicing.
But I said, well that's not enough,
aren't there jugglers who can juggle five?
And fact is, there are jugglers who can juggle five.
But there are fewer jugglers juggling five than four,
so I said, well let's try this.
I took three in my right, two in my left.
Guess what happened?
Next thing I know I'm dropping all over the place.
But I found out that if I started practicing
every single day...
(clapping)
So I started with one,
went to two, went to three, went to four, went to five.
And what was talentlessness that I said I had,
was actually just a need for a lot of practice.
So here's story number two,
and this one relates I believe with everyone in the room.
How many of you, this goes for everyone,
how many of you have been sick before?
Have you ever been sick?
Is there anyone in the room who hasn't been sick?
In any form?
Probably no one, right?
We've all had some form of sickness,
a sniffle here, a headache there.
So here's what happened.
One Sunday, I don't know why I was skipping,
but I was skipping, I was going like this literally,
I think I Was in my church fellowship hall,
kind of like this,
and next thing I know I came down on my right ankle.
I said ow, that really hurts.
And within a couple minutes,
I literally couldn't walk, okay?
Very weird situation, right?
You ever had that where you're skipping,
one minute you're running,
next thing you know, you can't walk?
Well, here's the background.
When I was young, and this still goes for today,
when I was young, I loved gymnastics,
I loved distance running,
I loved basketball,
I was super athletic.
So how many of you are pretty athletic?
You love energy, you love sports, you love competition.
Several, okay so I was very athletic,
and one Sunday, I skip, and next thing I know
I can't walk, and I am in bed for three months
without feet.
I ended up having something really not common.
How many of you have had strep throat?
You've had strep throat.
Now the question is, how many of you have had strep feet?
Anyone?
There is something called post streptococcal arthropathy,
an arthritis coming from strep infection
settling in my body, missing my heart, going to my feet.
And I had an infection there.
And here's what happened,
I said my goodness, I am an athletic guy,
I love doing activities,
and I don't have any feet.
How am I supposed to do this?
Family friends came to the hospital,
I saw lots of family members,
someone brought this to me, I named him Floppy
because his ears are floppy, his legs are floppy,
and he reminds me of this.
I thought my life was gonna be over as I knew it.
But the interesting thing is it wasn't.
What I found out was just because
I'd lost use of my feet didn't mean
I'd lost use of myself, of my mind,
of my creativity, of my interest.
And I was in scouting at the time,
and next thing I knew,
I was studying how to become a better chess player,
I was learning how to balance objects on my face
for my circus as I sat there in a wheelchair
or sat on the edge of the bed,
I was balancing objects on my face.
I learned all kinds of creative things,
including how to juggle better, and even...
Does anyone know what break dancing is?
(collective yes)
I even studied break dancing
when I had no feet.
And I'd practice balancing on my hands on the floor,
and I started using that technique
in almost every single circus-like performance I had.
So, when you're sick next time,
and you don't feel very well,
and my feet had felt terrible,
remember you haven't lost yourself, okay?
There's still a piece of you
that can be used to put a smile on someone else's face,
you can still be learning,
be your creative self, look for the opportunity.
Now what I'm going to ask for,
does anyone have a hat that I can borrow?
Thank you, I'll give it right back, I promise.
Here's what I did.
So I was sitting on the edge of the bed, okay?
Here's what I practiced.
(crowd exclaims)
I was just sitting there,
and I would go like this,
and here's what happened.
So I didn't have feet.
May I borrow this chair, is that okay?
So I didn't have feet,
but I still had a nose that was perfectly good.
(crowd exclaiming)
I hadn't lost myself, I still had my chin,
I still had my nose,
and I ended up getting over
what I thought was the end of me.
The third question I have,
is how many of you, this goes for everyone,
how many of you have used
an electronic gadget like a cell phone?
(crowd excitement)
How many of you here have used electronics?
How many of you have one right now in the room?
When I was in my college dorm room,
my first year,
I really wanted to figure out
how I could create a business,
because I was really interested in business,
because I had been a professional freelance entertainer
at the age of 12.
I did juggling, unicycling, magic,
all kinds of things that you've seen
in little bits and pieces here and there.
I was a clown, professional at 12,
and I said I wanna do a different kind of business.
I'm still gonna juggle all the time,
but where's an opportunity?
I started looking around me and I said,
well I don't have money to my name really,
at least I don't have much, it doesn't seem,
and so I thought I couldn't be a business person.
I thought I couldn't start a business.
But then you know what I discovered?
Everyone at some point breaks their gadget.
How many of you have broken
an electronic gadget at some time?
(crowd murmuring)
I discovered that pretty much everyone
at some point breaks something electronic,
gadget that's important to their life.
And I did just a couple weeks ago.
Next thing I know I start buying and selling these
with like $50 I started with.
And I started repairing and selling, repairing and selling,
learning all about the gadgets.
And I would fix them for other people,
make their gadget healthy again.
It ended up turning into something where
I was hiring several others to be involved,
we started carrying tens of thousands of these.
And I discovered
that it's not
that you're missing something like money
to start off with necessarily.
You need to look for the opportunity.
Look all around because they're around you
if you'll only look.
So the question you probably have in your minds,
is how does this relate to scouting?
It's a legitimate question.
Well,
when I was in scouting,
I became pretty passionate about learning new things.
I ended up
one day
being at a scout camp in Texas called Worth Ranch.
It's near the Brazos River.
And another scout,
after I mentioned,
Well one day, I was a brand new scout,
one day I wanted to get all the merit badges, right?
That sounds really difficult,
how would I get all the merit badges?
And the other scout decided to let me know
that that was impossible.
Well, I wasn't sure how to react to that
because I, up to that point in my life,
thought that everything was possible.
And so I decided to go all in
and get all the scouting merit badges.
But it wasn't until later, in life,
that I figured out why that was really important.
And not just to get a badge on a uniform.
I found out that creative minds,
inquisitive minds,
seeking opportunities with scouting,
attaining ranks for themselves,
to learn how to interact with others,
has all kinds of skills
that apply to real later life.
That goes for leadership,
that goes for citizenship,
that goes for just understanding how to say,
"You know what? We're all human beings,
we're all imperfect, we all make mistakes,
and I can understand that."
Scouting ended up playing a role in my juggling life,
in me overcoming my sickness life,
in me understanding how to do entrepreneurship,
and American business,
and the question is, for everyone here,
how many of you are gonna shoot for Eagle?
And how many of you are going to give me a phone call,
Bob has my phone number,
how many of you are going to give me a phone call
when you make Eagle?
- [Bob] I see a lot of promises in the room.
- So this goes for the scouts in the room,
and it goes for everyone else who is past the
eighteen-year-old age bracket to go for Eagle.
Leaders, when you're feeling like
you're not necessarily making progress,
when you feel like life is getting super busy
and you feel like you can't commit to the program,
or you feel like too much is going in life, too hectic,
remember that what you do in scouting
for these young guys, these young people,
really makes a massive difference.
If I hadn't have had scouting,
I wouldn't have necessarily seen challenges in life,
opportunities in life, the same way.
So I just want to encourage you to keep going.
And for every young person up here,
one day you're gonna be a little older,
but between now and then,
be ready to give me a call before your 18th birthday,
say, "Parker, I got Eagle, it wasn't impossible."
And, I just want to say,
thank you for this opportunity,
thank you for having me here,
and call me any time you wanna learn how to juggle, okay?
(applause)
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