Monday, September 13, 2004


My Brother Brian's Epic Saga Of Spending One Lost Day At A Motivational Seminar--The Kind You See On TV But Never Seriously Thought Anyone You Knew Would Actually Go, But When His Company Paid, Suddenly My Brother Is There!


(As Told In His Own Words.)

Part One: Let’s Get Motivated!

So this seminar that my boss got us tickets to began at 8:00 a.m., and started with scary indoor fireworks, which have always frightened me. Something about indoor explosions repulses me….I don’t know why. It was what I thought it would be, a lot of circular talk. Small paragraphs and monologues about self esteem, and fear of failure, punctuated with a remark on how America is the best country in the world, at which point the audience would clap. Or how much they really respected what all those troops are doing over there and at home. (More clapping) And how we won’t let those pesky terrorists change our way of life. (Lots of clapping) How you won’t get anywhere, let alone fail, if you never try, and if you try as hard as you can, it is the best you can do, and you should be happy with that. “Winners never quit, and quitters never win…” was the watchword of the day. These words are true, but it was like some sort of repeating Full House episode where Stephanie got a bad grade on her report card, and DJ told her she should change her ‘D’ to a ‘B’, and Michelle told Uncle Jessie, and he told Danny, and Danny had a long talk to Stephanie about doing her best, and effort, and responsibility. Danny said that no matter what could ever happen he would always love Stephanie with all his heart and then they hug. (Awwwwww………) Only it lasted for over two hours.

Part Two: Sermon On The Mount

Then everything got weird. It started with some talk about God. Just a mentioning, nothing more, so I dismissed it. Before you know it, it was a full blown christian conversion party, There was all sorts of God talk going around and how if you want to be successful, you need to have faith, and without faith, you would be misguided and frazzled, and basically worthless in a business sense. So all the atheists are basically unemployable crap-faces as far as this seminar is concerned. People are eating this stuff up, and the ruckus is getting louder now and I can’t believe that I am being paid to come to what has become for all practical purposes, a sermon/revival. There was a guy who talked about faith, and told us about some bible passages. He then offered us a prayer cd-rom, and a prayer email. Every two weeks you too can become closer to Jesus via the internet. So just to remind you, these tickets cost money. Like $50.00 U.S Dollars. Not like $50.00, it actually was $50.00. We could have gone to see Cher on her farewell tour, or the Rolling Stones on their 3rd farewell tour. We could have had any number of big headline bands, or maybe a couple of good plays. Or we could have gotten piss drunk. Lastly, we could have just gone to some church for free.

Part Three: The Speakers Speak

So like I said these tickets cost money, and there are several speaker of note. The primary players are:

*George from NBC’s ‘The Apprentice’. George told us to make sure we make lists, losts of note taking is essential to good business. Be prepared, and write everything doen in a spiral notebook. He says this specifically: “Yes, spiral notebooks, no post-its, you will just lose them and they never stick anyway. Only use SPIRAL NOTEBOOKS…” I am not sure if he has some sort of deal with the paper companies to hawk their wares. I can see him accepting a suitcase full of cash while the trench coated paper goon is telling him to talk trash about computers, palms, and ‘other note taking devices which may cause people to lose focus on paper.’ He then proceeded to make fun of Omarosa from season one. (Which is fine with me, I couldn’t stand the woman.) Then he just told us to make sure we watch season 2 of ‘The Apprentice’. He said it over ten times in less than a half hour. Then he collected another suitcase of money and left.

*Matt Hasselbeck, NFL quarterback for the Seattle Seahawks was not even there. He was interviewed from the training field so that doesn’t really count as speaking, it is more like watching T.V. with 6-9,000 other people. He just talked about how the Seahawks are going to: ‘Take it to the top this year…Oh we definitely have a great chance of going all the way…..Oh yeah.’ Oh yes, he said three sentences on how important teamwork is. Then he just talked about how important he is to this team this year, and how they are working on defense, and ball handling. A man then came and gave him a suitcase full of money, and the screen faded.

Lunch was then had by all.

After lunch, we heard Dick Vitalle. He was one of the first sports commentators for ESPN. He was actually really good. He was very passionate. He joked, yelled, paced and was generally very motivating. He spoke about how making the choice to start your own business or follow your dream is easy, it’s the work and sacrifice that is hard. He told a touching story about his daughter while she was in college, and he actually had people’s undivided attention for 30 minutes. He waited until he was off stage to get his suitcase of money.

Then it happened:

All the work, all the time, sweat, money, and indoor fireworks displays that had been poured into captivating and motivating us, the audience, was all laid to waste in 15 minutes by Goldie Hawn. Yes, Goldie Hawn. It sounds strange, yet it is factual. She actually did the most damage with one sentence. Remember we had been there for 5+ hours thus far, listening to people tell us over and over that you must be decisive and hard working to get what you want. Goldie Hawn comes in to great applause and as it dies down she takes a big breath and starts her little spcheal, and then she starts talking about how her career started. That is when she says: ‘I didn’t want to be an actress. I wanted to, and studied dance. I wanted to be a dancer, and I was dancing in a go-go bar and I went to N.Y. and I met this producer guy who told me to go to L.A. and I went to this audition and the guy said he liked my voice and that is how I got Laugh In…..I really just fell into my Career. At first I really really didn’t want to act, but I thought I was making good money…….’ Boom! She dropped a giant fucking nuclear bomb full of anti-motivation radiation. It was a lethal dose for everyone in the building, even in the bathrooms. She then spent the last five minutes talking about how laughter is very important to living a healthy life. No one was really laughing at that point. Enter suitcase, exit Goldie.

Then we had the last memorable speaker: Rudy Gulianni. Except that the M.C. announced him as the Mayor of NYC. He used to be the mayor, but he isn’t now. It’s not like he is or was the president of the United States. So the fireworks start up and ballons are falling and there is confetti shimmering in the lights and everyone is screaming. Suddenly, a man jumps out with a gun and points it at Gulianni. Then, Clint Eastwood moves the mayor out of the way, taking the bullet for his country, and his president. Rudy picks up Clint’s .44 magnum and shoots the would-be assassin in the knee. Unfortunately the guys knee explodes from the impact, and he dies from shock holding the bloody stump, crying for forgiveness. Rudy helps Clint to the ambulance when it is revealed that Clint had a bullet proof vest on. Rudy smiles and then punched Clint in the face for scaring him like that. Then they hugged. (Awwwwww…..)

O.K. so that didn’t really all happen like that. Yes, Rudy Gulianni was really there. No, Clint Eastwood was not. Yes, Rudy Gulianni spoke about leadership, and such. Yes his is quite well spoken. No there was no assassin. Yes, he did get a suitcase full of money.