Hey everybody, Cheryl Knowlton coming at you with a slightly different dynamite tip of the day. This one is very, very personal, I promise you at some point during this short but sweet video, I will cry.
Back in 1995, if you can get in a time machine and go back with me that far, in preparation for the very first keynote that I ever delivered, it was for a discovery toys event in Los Angeles, California and I was gonna be speaking with the president of the company who was the actual keynote speaker. And I was so excited and I wanted to deliver something really unique and very powerful.
I made two pieces of intellectual property
I created two pieces, amazing intellectual property for that keynote that has stayed with me and I’m actually finally resurrecting them after all of these years and bringing them back. The first one was a poem that I wrote about my daughters. And here they are. They are so adorable, this is many years ago. Now they are all wives and mothers and beautiful, fabulous adults that I’m proud to call my friends.
But first, they were my little girls. So here I have this poem for you and as I share this poem with you, think about the things that you could do in your life to carve out those moments, to take time for the people that are the most important to you. Ready? Here we go.
It’s called monuments.
I like to look at monuments and wonder what was done by the person standing there and what great honors won. “What made your life so great?” I ask the silent tranquil granite. Who’s life improved, whom did you touch while you were on the planet?
I’ve often wished that I could do something just half as wise that someone might then make of me, a monument that size. But then, I stop myself mid-thought and begin to realize, I do have my own monuments before my very eyes. More than one of them have I, they live within my walls. My children are my monuments, their laughter fills our halls. A parent’s touch is all they need, my love for them I’ll show to lead and guide them while they’re young, to help them as they grow.
I’ll take the time to play with them, although there are lots to do for if I do my chores instead, I never will get through. And for all the tasks I do, it seems, two come back in their places. Besides, I’d rather see the look of you upon their faces. I have such precious little time while I can be their guard to teach and train and mold and shape until they will be hard. For children harden with their age as statues always do, before you know their attitudes are bonded just like glue.
Today, I’ll find some time to play where I thought I had none. We’ll sing and dance and laugh a while until the day is done. And so, I may not ever have a monument of stone … Sorry. I’d rather have a monument of real life, flesh, and bone.
And that is your highly emotional very, very personal, very vulnerable dynamite tip of the day.