Well, let’s see. I haven’t felt much like writing lately. Another slump I suppose. I’ve noticed none of my blogging friends have written much lately, so I guess it’s going around.
Tuesday & Wednesday I attended the Indiana Youth Institutes Annual Kids Count in Indiana conference. It was fun. I went with my friend Jama who also works with kids, so it was an easy excuse for us to have fun together and expand our minds at the same time.
The Keynote speaker of day 1 (Keith L. Brown) was quite possibly the best motivational speaker I’ve ever seen. And for some reason it seems like I’ve seen a lot of motivational speakers. He was amazing. He had us all dancing, singing, chanting, rapping, yelling, cheering, hi-fiving, dancing to Y-M-C-A, sitting on each others’ laps, saying positive affirmations to each other, and at one point he even crowd surfed. I’m not quite sure how to explain his energy but I was welling up with tears one minute and hunched over laughing the next. Good stuff. Later on the second day he was standing at his booth rapping to a bunch of people (who were dancing along) about why kids should stay in school.
Day 2’s keynote speaker (and really the reason why I chose this conference) was Liz Murray - whose extraordinary life was made into a Lifetime Original Movie called From Homeless to Harvard. This is a movie I have been showing to teens for years in my profession, as a motivating tool to overcome hardships and obstacles in life. I was so excited to see her speak. And she did not disappoint. Her story is incredible, she was raised by drug addicted parents who were plagued with mental illness and blindness, and eventually AIDS, survived being homeless and without an education, the death of her parents, being in and out of the system, and managed to find the inner strength, with the help of a wonderful mentor, to squeeze 4 years of high school in 2 years (while homeless and sleeping on subways) while getting straight A’s - and eventually earned to a full ride scholarship to Harvard University from the New York TImes. Anyway, my explanation doesn’t do her story justice, but her story is incredible. She recently was on Oprah, and speaks all over about her accomplishments. She was wonderfully inspiring.
Here are a few pics of the conference. The first (I can’t figure out this caption thing right now) is Liz Murray. The second is Keith L. Brown entertaining at his booth and the third is him dancing during his presentation.
One Comment, Comment or Ping
Dawn
At first, I thought the first picture was you. :0)
December 4th, 2009
Reply to “Much needed Inspiration”