incredibly excited so how do i get to become a motivational speaker it it wasn't something it wasn't something that was planning on you know it it's the type of thing where i i grew up getting into a good amount of trouble growing up i like to say that i'm a recovered troubled child and there was you know that there were certain times in my life where there were there were people who cared enough to step into my life intervene and kind of point me in the right direction when i take a look at you know  i believe right a defining moment in my life where i decided that i no longer wanted to be the person that i once was and that i really truly wanted to go from being a taker to a giver i had made a decision to change my life and when i did that it was with the help of a lot of dedicated and loving mentors i say mentors because they were what i found was that i was in trouble and then i needed help yeah and when i reached my head down and started to ask for help people were willing to go ahead and do that and i started to absolutely fall in love with the power of positive thinking with starting to live a life of abundance and really doing everything that i could to focus on the good that was going on in my life rather than the perspective i had once always and it was it was pretty transfer from ational i was i was on my way to disney world and we had we had planned my wife and i were planning on staying at the animal kingdom lodge which is a amazing lodge and whatnot but when you read the reviews there were a couple of different takeaways that you had to be concerned with and the the largest critique that people had of this particular lodge was that the buses were too for in between each other but i read it all right but i love the audiobook and the whole way down there i was really really harassing my wife with how much the world is my oyster and that everything operates exactly the way that i wanted to i had and i'm telling you every time we left our hotel room we would walk up and if the bus wasn't there it was pulling up by the we're at our seventh found was the more and more into this that i became the more and more i started to let other people know about the good things that were happening in my life and asking them to experiment with me to to to grab ahold of the exact same movement what i found was that that it got even bigger and better and brighter for me that the more and more i encourage other people to do this the more and more i found my own encouragement and it's it's been a journey since then yeah now you were when you first mortgage is that are was right so it's kind of funny to set that up for  alcoholism is the bottom line and one day i woke up and i had a real big boy job i was working for one of the four major banks providing reverse mortgages out there and  what i found was once i sobered up i had i started to take life one day at a time i started to apply the same principles that were working in my relationships at home and in my community a work and i started to excel has as much as i started to excel reaching goals i mean i had you know one point i reckon were three in the country in total production and great things were happening for me but what i found was that it as much as i enjoyed it and i loved helping people it didn't make my heart sing yeah i got a friend like that yeah yeah i mean i grew up on a construction site i put i i don't know that i ever belonged in corporate america i fit well there you know but it it didn't necessarily make my heart sing to do with underwriters and processors and  know yes so i found success there with the people i found success in in corporate america but my happiness wasn't there so you know somewhere along the way someone introduced me to this concept that perhaps being a taker my entire life that i should really put forth an effort to become a giver and make a concerted effort so you know i had at what some point i was i was at a chamber of commerce meeting in in support of new jersey and diane taylor who i know that you know the c e o of passage she came up to me and she asked me if i would volunteer with pass it along and i said absolutely  what can i do to help and she explained to me that the next upcoming event that they had was a dodgeball tournaments now there's a thing well i do a little bit of a history with dodgeball and i'm actually coming up on it's my twenty year high school reunion coming up and my whole dodgeball gym teacher is going to be at the reunion i used to cut class in order to go and go to her i think it would go to her gym so in any event she invited me to come and and play dodgeball and something happened you know i grabbed five of my buddies we showed up we were supposed to dress up and have like team names and we wore a tuxedo t shirts we were called the wedding crashers but everybody there was in high school so they called us the old team and the thing about so this is six years ago and i understand they're really implementing dodgeball under a new name  many different this area six and yes six years ago they were not playing dodgeball right so we showed up and there were players who were who're outfielders on their high school baseball team people who can throw the ball home from the outfield sorry i throw i look like a six year old left it like it doesn't mean i'm not built like for competitive dodgeball but i understand the game great so we put a couple of strategies  place i mean the game itself is a misnomer it's called dodgeball but it should be called catch ball back to catch the ball they get out rates to persons when we went up against twenty two teams and defeated and took home pass it along first ever dodge ball target i know terry  guy of course knew i know it's here annually and the thing was this was my first real introduction to volunteering i had never had an experience like this i was enjoying myself and when all  and done they think me for doing it and i didn't feel like i'd done anything you know and this organization asked me to come back and asked me if i would help out with a little ball tournaments so i started running with a ball tournaments for them and then  as that was happening i started to get more and more involved with the teams in my community and i'll tell you there's something amazing about teenagers today there's something amazing about kids today man and my world l up you know everything became technicolor again and and yet that that began my inner duction to working with teams in the community yeah now through pass along so  doesn't have a teenager right now doesn't mean b c into this like there's real struggles there's really challenges and it's ok right we've always had challenges always always always every generation's and challenges their challenges are are these kids are and what you see in terms of the changes sure so i did a couple of different things right there are there are definite struggles going on here nationally and locally in our own communities here new medical center had done a community health needs assessment and found out that in sussex county where i'm from there was a lack of support for drug abuse alcohol abuse and all different forms of self horror mental health issues that needed support and days and he asked me said tim if you could do anything if you could do anything to approach the drug and alcohol abuse problem amongst teens today what would you do and  you know i simply turned to him and i i said i'd stop focusing on the problem and i'd start working on the solution you know and when you take a look at who falls in to this trouble lifestyle you know what are the things that they are lacking it is support at home it is a sense of self worth a lot of times it's a lack of self confidence there are a number of different reasons  and it's different for everybody however the solution always tends to be the opposite of you know let's let's give them support let's let's help them to find their own value in life let's help them to find confidence and how do you do that so with with pass that along what i found is you just open the doors and ask them to come in what i found from working with teens is that the more and more you ask them what's going on with their life the more and more they'll explain it to you yeah and the more and more they were given the opportunity to speak for themselves to own their own feelings and then to help each other through these times it's amazing it's amazing you know people talk about like what's wrong with kids today and it's i mean you've heard me speak before so you know it's something they've been saying for centuries absolutely you know they had there were problems with kids today from my great great grandparents and the problems today exist or different than anything before so to me as a parent i look at that and i think who that's different that's scary that's that's change i don't like that you know but at glad you're talking about it they are tapped into a global mind like nobody ever before their ability to go online and find out exactly what's going on in any tragedy across the world and to get a real understanding a real like grasp of the feelings and the struggles that these people are going through is putting them in a position to help each other more than anybody else and when you look at the human race we are specifically designed to help one another half were genetically geared to do it and so for the first time we have a generation of compassionate young people who are tied into technology that is doing nothing but making them smarter yet when they've done studies from going back to the one nine hundred thirty s not just in america but internationally anywhere there's been standardized tests what they found is that we keep on getting smarter and smarter and these kids are crap and hold it there and when they're given the support and the structure and the love and the ability to own what they're doing amazing things it's an incredible story because they can create and they can solve and they are very plugged into social justice and you know they're looking out crying out for what can i do how do i how do i make a difference with this i'm reading about it but what can i do about it and see you social justice is huge you made a comment in your talk there really loved  about their dollar right so their dollar they get it that that dollar is going to make it do friends and where they put that matters so it's not necessarily about me putting that dollar in the bank for my rainy day it's about what can i do with this dollar to help what's happening here absolutely and they care about people based on their character yes in their wallet yeah they care more about what's in someone's heart and they're more likely when you take a look at the corporate perspective they are more likely to go after a job that's going to make their heart sink ye know there's a big focus on hey you know you leave who you are at the door and then you come on in right and we own you for eight hours a day and that's it you're going to do what we need to do then you go back to your life well that doesn't exist anymore the whole person comes through the door whatever is going on in their life their family their friends gets gets engaged to go away to a room and get engaged to one o'clock in the afternoon well hell up there were explaining to me how terrible these video games were for me and what they've done there were studies on the benefits of video games and they find that it creates that ability for abstract thought they're very often when they  spend time studying how to play clash of clans or whatever it is that they're playing today and then that itself is actually creating a thought process that otherwise would have ever been there that that the kids today are in are in a unique position to handle things being thrown at them from any direction right right there and i need to hear that it's my thirteen year old and then video game master yeah yeah there are times you do you wrestle with it you know so yeah yes that's that's that's good that's important so let me touch on something else that that we were talking about and i and again obviously my point of reference so much of the time is is kind of in corporate america and i know you've done a whole host of speaking on that level as well so so there is and i want to talk more about the use and mission driven speaking that you've done and then the corporate piece sure so you know we're with the core piece what i find what i find a lot of employees are stuck with today is this feeling as though they are working incredibly hard and sometimes that they almost get and barest about that yeah you know they get you look at it and industry like real estate you know realtors out there are constantly bombarded with negative perceptions in the media in social media i'm like i mean these are you know whatever that is and you know when when you go up to one and and you ask a realtor like why do you do what you do the answer every single time it's not because i love answering phone calls that had ten o'clock and i on a sunday it's not because they love stuffing envelopes on thursday night saying no it's not because they have to pack into a bed on a tuesday morning and you know they do this stuff because they love to help people and more and more people in america care about helping other people and it's the it's the focus of my talk if if i'm dealing with middle schoolers high schoolers college yes and on the corporate level it's the same thing focusing on what about helping people and helping me you know that that  whole it is the giver who truly receives like why do i get so excited on christmas morning to give somebody else a gift you know why am i not waiting like i was when i was six years old because we build their children up but it has a ripple effects when you when you yeah and and some people and to your point even in you talking about your journey until you make that step and you see how good it can be you know i mean a lot of times people are heads down i need to because they're living they're living almost in that world of fear you know fearful i don't do this this way i don't get a paycheck or churn you know i don't i don't i don't succeed in this to do the best version of me that that would be enough you know i spent a large part of my life feeling as though i wasn't enough i wasn't adequate and as a result i wouldn't even live up to the inadequacy i was ready to settle for that you know it's the concept of doing exactly what i can the best that i can working hard i'm not saying like sit back and kick it like just let life happen to you absolutely not grab the bull by the words and do everything that you can to make the day your day but to understand that specifically my best is good enough and if the more and more people that we can get working to their best the more and more amazing things that are going to continue happening in this country right right well i mean once we're created for who you know what are we here today yes and i don't want i'm here to give you now  and just asking that question and it's funny because in one of oprah's most recent interviews where she's talking about bullying and her new series she mentions that there is one question that she asks and seems to always do the show after the show and she would ask especially women in her audience what do you really want and she said is the number one question people cannot answer yeah you know and saying get clear what what is that who is that and whatever that going on he asked them to questions who are you and what do you want you know without figuring out who i am or what i want as executor says like that the man would have to target his none the that that plane analogy that nobody hops onto an airplane without figuring out where the destination is you know we really have to figure out what our goals are in order to be able to achieve them yeah absolutely yeah yeah and goals become a scary time so the easiest way to get a hold of me is just a log on to my website to jackson talks dot com all of my information is on there and a little demo video to