Danny+A’+Final+AmEx+2014+Speech

=Title of Speech= Motivational America

=Text of Speech=

Can’t, Fail, these words I have just said I know we have all heard thousands of times in our lives and have been brought down with the phrase “you can’t do this or you can’t do that”. These words have always aggravated me; these words have put me down through moments of my life when I needed the motivation to keep pursuing my goals and all they did was keep me from my goals. This boy right here from the beginning, set out a goals for his years in high school such as to lose weight and become fit and also exceed in his education by setting out and focusing on making it in AP junior year. This boy right here is me in freshmen year. From the beginning of my freshmen year I remember wanting to lose weight reasons of being unhappy the way I look and also feeling uncomfortable with my body and wanting to do sports and other activities that my out of shape body kept me from doing. I remember through my freshmen year I was always put down, kids telling me that I was fat and also telling I was dumb just because of my race. Since the beginning of my freshmen year I was always wanting to pass the fitness test for PE but these kids I supposedly called friends freshmen year would always tell me you can’t even run what makes you think you can run a mile or do push-ups and although I still had a semester left I believed them, I quit trying to lose weight freshmen year and trying to get fit because all that I could hear freshmen ringing in my head while trying to diet and lose weight was you can’t do it. Although these are just words, they can have a lot of impact on people just like me and keep them from succeeding in their goals. Then came sophomore year, I got rid of my so called friends and made new friends, friends that wouldn’t put me down nor judge me for the way I look. In fact my friends who I am close to till this day have always motivated me in my decision and goals. Although they did help me get back on my weight loss goal I had a major set back by Tearing my ACL during football and this really put me down I couldn’t exercise for months and took me 8 months to start running. At this point I needed all of the motivation I could get. I had gone from 270 to 240 and back up to 280 during my recovery, luckily with the help of my friends and most importantly my parents, my long awaited dedicational journey of losing weight started. Towards the end of the year I had finally gotten accepted to AP and also those phrases you can’t do it turned into my motivation in the gym from last year of April until now I went from 280lbs. to 195lbs. What keeps me going are the people who have seen me improve and motivating me to keep improving and reach my goal, also to have those kids from freshmen year looking at me with eyes wide open and jaw dropping barely being able to tell that I’m the obese kid from freshmen year. And also knowing that I proved them wrong in exceeding in my education and here I am at the end of my junior year in AP. Although I didn’t think I could make it through I always had that one friend telling me I could do it and make it through the year, in fact he even motivated me during the AP test when I was freaking out during the test just by repeating “you this man”. The America I want to live in is a negative free America and a motivational America because by simply motivating that one person you can help them push through that obstacle they are trapped by and help them reach their goal because remember that feeling of someone actually believing in them can get them far and help them in succeeding just like me.

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