See it's hard when you are 49 years old

been working on a job for 17 years

and they come in and tell you you're finished

and give you one week's severance pay

and you have to start all over again.

It's hard when you're married and raising children

and your children are crawling

and your husband dies unexpectedly.

It's hard handling just the tragedies of life.

It's hard when you're working on something

and, and you put everything you have in it

and it doesn't work out, you lose your money

and other people's money.

It's hard, it was rough when I lost my job

and I could not find a job.

It was humiliating and embarrassing borrowing money

and then I couldn't pay the money back

when I told them I would.

That's rough, how people look at you,

how they respond to you,

it's very hard, it's humiliating.

Here's what I discovered that happens to you in life

that you will go through things and while you're going

through them you can't understand why it's happening to 'ya

but after you go through it and you get back

and you look at it, then you say oh,

now I understand why I needed that lesson.

Have you ever had it happen to you raise your hand,

did it ever happen to you that,

that I couldn't understand it there

but after I got through it then I saw

that that was preparing me for bigger and better things.

As you go through the challenges of life

and you look at it and embrace whatever comes to you

don't run from it, step toward it.

Don't try and duck it like most people do.

See most people want it easy, see if you easy come,

easy what, easy go, see but when you go at

what you're going to deal with

and you deal with the difficulties of it,

when you handle those hard things close at hand,

making those hard decisions right now

that you don't wanna make, learning those things

that you don't like to do, but you know

that in order for you to get where you wanna go,

this is one of the hoops that you have to flip through.

And I'm saying to you whatever you gotta do, do it,

because if you don't life is gonna whoop you

until you surrender, and say, okay,

alright, alright, alright, alright,

I'll cooperate, okay I'll learn, okay,

he had to wear me out a long time.

So I've been taught then do it hard.

Now how do you hang in there during the hard difficult times

lest you must have faith.

You've gotta believe in yourself.

You've got to believe in your abilities.

You've got to believe in your service, your company,

your ideas, unquestionably.

You've got to have faith and that faith gives you patience

that is not gonna happen as quickly

as you want it to happen.

A lot of things gonna happen that will catch you off guard

and so therefore you've got to deal with,

and handle it as it comes and not only that

but that faith and patience drives you into action,

you've got to keep moving and keep plugging away.

In the Far East they have something that's called,

the Chinese bamboo tree.

The Chinese bamboo tree takes five years to grow.

They have to water and fertilize the ground

where it is every day and it doesn't break through

the ground until the fifth year.

But once it breaks through the ground

within five weeks it grows 90 feet tall.

Now the question is, does it grow 90 feet tall

in five weeks or five years?

The answer is obvious, it grows 90 feet tall in five years

because at any time had that person stopped

watering and nurturing and fertilizing that tree,

that bamboo tree would have died in the ground.

And I can see people coming out talking to a guy,

out there watering and fertilizing the ground

that's not showing anything, hey, what 'ya doing?

(audience laughing)

You've been out here a long time now,

and the conversation in the neighborhood is,

you're growing a Chinese bamboo tree, that right?

(audience laughing)

Yeah, that's right.

Well um, even Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder

can see there ain't nothin' showing.

(audience laughing and clapping)

You know that's how people are gonna do you,

so how long you been working on this?

How long have you been working on your dream,

and you have nothing to show,

this is all you've got to show?

People gonna do that to you.

And some people ladies and gentlemen they stop

because they don't see instant results,

it doesn't happen quickly, they stop, oh, no, no, no, no.

You gotta keep on watering your dream

and when it begin to happen, they stop laughing.

They say, look, whoa, look here, it's, look up,

hey man, you know, I know you could do it,

look, you got a job here (laughing).

(audience clapping and laughing)

See during those hard times we didn't know

how you're gonna make payroll during those times

when you fail and things didn't work out,

they were nowhere to be found.

You know what I discovered, when you're working

at your dream somebody said, the harder the better,

the sweeter the victory, oh it's sweet to 'ya.

It's good to 'ya, why?

See when you, when it's hard and there's a struggle

see what you become in the process

is more important than the dream.

That's far more important.

The kind of person you become, the character

that you build, the courage that you develop,

the faith that you're manifesting,

oh, it's something that you get up in the morning,

you look yourself in the mirror,

you're a different kind of person,

you walk with a different kind of spirit.

People know that you know what life is

that you have embraced life, you know it was hard,

but you did it hard.

(clapping)

(dramatic music)