Rick Rigsby was ready to give up, merely existing day to day.

But then he remembered the lessons his father taught him years before.

Dr. Rigsby recalled these lessons as he delivered a powerfully moving graduation speech at California State University Maritime Academy.

Rigsby spoke about his late father, who despite being a third grade dropout, was regarded as the smartest person that Rigsby knew.

Dr. Rigsby guides us through the practical knowledge that his late father shared with him, which guided him through the most difficult times of his life.

Lessons From A Third Grade Dropout | Dr. Rick Rigsby

Full Transcript | Speaker: Dr. Rick Rigsby

The wisest person I ever met in my life, a third grade dropout.

Wisest and dropout in the same sentence is rather moronic, like jumbo shrimp.. like fun run, ain’t nothing fun about it.. like Microsoft works, ya’ll don’t hear me. I used to say like country music but I’ve lived in Texas so long I love country music now, I hunt, I fish, I have cowboy boots, ya’ll im a blackneck redneck. Do you hear what I’m saying to you? No longer oxymoronic for me to say country music. And it’s not oxymoronic for me to say third grade and dropout.

That third grade dropout, the wisest person I ever met in my life, who taught me to combine knowledge and wisdom to make an impact, was my father.

A simple cook. Wisest man I ever met in my life. Just a simple cook. Left school in the third grade to help out on the family farm but just because he left school doesn’t mean his education stopped.

Mark Twain once said, “I’ve never allowed my schooling to get in the way of my education.”

My father taught himself how to read, taught himself how to write. Decided in the midst of Jim Crowism, as America was breathing the last gasp of the Civil War, my father decided he was going to stand and be a man, not a black man, not a brown man, not a white man, but a man.

He literally challenged himself to be the best that he could all the days of his life.

I have four degrees, my brother is a judge. We’re not the smartest ones in our family. It’s a third grade dropout daddy, a third grade dropout daddy who was quoting Michelangelo, saying to us, “Boys, I won’t have a problem if you aim high and miss but I’m going to have a real issue if you aim low and hit.”

A country mother quoting Henry Ford, saying, “If you think you can or if you think you can’t, you’re right.” I learned that from a third grade dropout, simple lessons. Lessons like these. “Son, you’d rather be an hour early than a minute late.” We never knew what time it was at my house ’cause the clocks were always ahead. My mother said for nearly 30 years, my father left the house at 3:45 in the morning. One day she asked him, “Why, Daddy?”

He said, “Maybe one of my boys will catch me in the act of excellence.”

I want to share two things with you, Aristotle said, you are what you repeatedly do therefore excellence ought to be a habit not an act. Don’t ever forget that.

I know you’re tough but always remember to be kind. Always. Don’t ever forget that. Never embarrass momma. Yeah if momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy. If daddy ain’t happy, don’t nobody care but you know..

Next lesson, lesson from a cook over there in the galley. Son, make sure your servant’s towel is bigger than your ego.

Ego is the anaesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity. Ya’ll might have a relative in mind you want to send that to.

Let me say it again. Ego is the anaesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity. Pride is the burden of a foolish person.

John Wooden coached basketball in UCLA for a living but his calling was to impact people. And with all those national championships, guess what he was found doing in the middle of the week? Going into the cupboard, grabbing a broom and swiping his own gym floor.

You want to make an impact? Find your broom.

Every day of your life, you find your broom. You grow your influence that way. That way you’re attracting people so that you can impact them.

Final lesson. “Son, you’re going to do a job, do it right.” I’ve always been told how average I can be. Always been criticized about being average but I want to tell you something. I stand here before you, before all of these people not listening to those words but telling myself every single day to shoot for the stars, to be the best that I can be. Good enough isn’t good enough if it can be better. And better isn’t good enough if it can be best.

Let me close with a very personal story that I think will bring all this into focus.

Wisdom will come to you in the unlikeliest of sources. A lot of times through failure. When you hit rock bottom remember this, while you’re struggling, rock bottom can also be a great foundation on which to build and on which to grow. I’m not worried that you’ll be successful. I’m worried that you won’t fail from time to time.

A person that gets up off the canvas and keeps growing, thats the person that will continue to grow their influence.

Back in the 70’s, to help me make this point, let me introduce you to someone. I met the finest woman I’d ever met in my life. Back in my day we’d have called her a brick house. This woman was the finest woman I’d ever seen in my life. There’s just one little problem. Back then ladies didn’t like big old line men. The blindside hadn’t come out yet.. They liked quarterback and running backs.

We’re at this dance and I find out her name is Trina Williams from Lompoc, California.

We were all dancing and we’re just excited and I decide in the middle of dancing with her that I would ask her for her phone number. She, Trina was the first one, Trina was the only woman in college who gave me her real telephone number. The next day we walked to Baskin and Robbins ice cream parlor. My friends couldn’t believe it. This has been 40 years ago and my friends still can’t believe it. We go on a second date and a third date and a fourth date. We drive from Chico to Vallejo so that she could meet my parents. My father meets her. My daddy, my hero, he meets her, pulls me to the side and says, “Is she psycho?” But anyway..

We go together for a year, two years, threee years, four years by now Trina’s a senior in college. I’m still a freshman but I’m working some things out. I’m so glad I graduated in four terms. Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan.

So now it’s time to propose. So I talked her girlfriends and it’s California, it’s the ’70s. It has to be outside, have to have a candle and you have to have, some chocolate. Listen, I’m from the hood. I had a bottle of Boone’s Farm wine. That’s what I had.

She said yes!

She said yes! That was the key. I married the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen in my life, ya’ll ever been to a wedding  and even before the wedding starts you hear this.. “How in the world?” And it was coming from my side of the family!

We get married, we have a few children. Our lives are great.

One day Trina finds a lump in her left breast. Breast cancer.

Six years after that diagnosis, me and my two little boys walked up to mommy’s casket and for two years my heart didn’t beat.

If it wasn’t for my faith in God, I wouldn’t be standing here today. If it wasn’t for those two little boys, there’s of been no reason for which to go on. I was completely lost. That was rock bottom.

You know what sustained me? The wisdom of a third grade dropout. The wisdom of a simple cook.

We’re at the casket. I’d never seen my dad cry but this time I saw my dad cry.

That was his daughter. Trina was his daughter not his daughter-in-law. And I’m right behind my father about to see her for the last time on this Earth and my father shared three words with me that changed my life right there at the casket.

It would be the last lesson he would ever teach me.

He said “Son,

“Just stand. You keep standing. You keep standing. No matter how rough the sea, you keep standing.“

And I’m not talking about just water. “You keep standing. No matter what, you don’t give up.”

As clearly as I’m talking to you today, these were some of her last words to me. She looked me in the eye and she said, “It doesn’t matter to me any longer how long I live. What matters to me most, is how I live.”

I ask you all one question, a question that I was asked all my life by a third grade dropout. “How you livin’?” Every day ask yourself that question. How you livin’?

Here’s what a cook would suggest you to live, this way..

That you would not judge, that you would show up early, that you’d be kind, that you’d make sure that that servant’s towel is huge and used, that if you’re going to do something, you do it the right way.

That cook would tell you this, that it’s never wrong to do the right thing, that how you do anything is how you do everything.

And in that way you will grow your influence to make an impact.

In that way you will honor all those who have gone before you, who have invested in you.

Look in those unlikeliest places for wisdom. Enhance your life every day by seeking that wisdom and asking yourself every night.. “How am I living?”

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Denzel Washington was flunking out of college, with no idea what he was going to do with his life. When one day while sitting in his mother’s beauty parlor, a random lady in the salon sitting under a hair dryer cried out for a pen, because a prophecy, a vision for the future had overcome her.

She told Denzel, “Boy, you are going to travel the world and speak to millions of people.” Denzel was perplexed, he was flunking out of college and his life was directionless.

No one in the salon that day believed that Denzel would go on to become one of the most recognisable faces in the world.

It wasn’t all plain sailing for Denzel Washington, along the way he learned that if you aren’t prepared to dream big and fail big you will never achieve your version of success.

Don’t Be Afraid to Fail Big, To Dream Big – Denzel Washington

Full Transcript | Speaker: Denzel Washington

I was flunking out of college, I had a 1.7 grade point average, I hope non of you can relate.

I had a 1.7 grade point average, I was sitting in my mother’s beauty shop, they still call it beauty shop now?

What they call it now? Yeah, I was sitting in the beauty parlor. I was sitting in my mother’s beauty parlor and I’m looking in the mirror, and I see behind me this woman under the dryer and every time she looked up, every time I looked up, she was looking at me, just looking me in the eye.

I didn’t know who she was, she said “Somebody get me a pen, get me a pencil, I have a prophecy.”

March 27, 1975, she said. “Boy, you are going to travel the world and speak to millions of people.” Now mind you, I was flunked out of college, I’m thinking about going the army, I didn’t know what I was going to do and she’s telling me I’m going to travel the world and speak to millions of people.

Well, I have travelled the world and I have spoke to millions of people.

That’s not the most important thing, the success that I had, the most important thing is that, what she taught me, and what she told me that day has stayed with me since.

I’ve been protected, I’ve been directed, I’ve been corrected.

Fail BIG. That’s right. Fail big.

You only live once, so do what you feel passionate about, take chances, professionally don’t be afraid to fail.

There’s an old IQ test that was nine dots and you had to draw five lines with a pencil within these nine dots without lifting the pencil. The only way to do it, was to go outside the box.

So don’t be afraid to go outside the box. Don’t be afraid to think outside the box.

Don’t be afraid to fail big, to dream big. But remember, dreams, without goals are just dreams.

They ultimately fuel disappointment. So have dreams, but have goals, life goals, yearly goals, monthly goals, daily goals.

I try to give myself a goal every day. Understand that to achieve these goals you must apply discipline and consistency. You have to work at it every day. You have to plan every day. You’ve heard the saying “We don’t plan to fail, we fail to plan.”

Hard work works. Working really hard is what successful people do. In this text, tweet, twerk world that you’ve grown up in, remember just because you’re doing a lot more doesn’t mean you’re getting a lot more done. Remember just because you’re doing a lot more doesn’t mean you’re getting a lot more done. Don’t confuse movement with progress. My mother told me, she said “Yeah because you can  run in place all the time and never get anywhere.”

Continue to strive, continue to have goals, continue to progress and anything you want good, you can have. Claim it, work hard to get it, when you get it reach back, pull someone else up. Each one teach one.

Don’t just aspire to make a living. Aspire to make a difference.

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William Henry Gates III was born in 1955 in Seattle, Washington. Born into an upper middle class family with an older & younger sister. Bill’s father William H. Gates Sr was a successful lawyer and his mother Mary, a teacher. Bill Gates was a voracious reader as a child, spending many hours poring over reference books such as the encyclopedia.

Around age 11 Bill’s parents noticed he was becoming bored and withdrawn at school. They decided to enrol him into Seattle’s exclusive preparatory Lakeside School. Bill excelled at maths and science and did well in English and Drama.

After scoring 1590 out of 1600 on his SAT‘s. Bill Gates applied to Harvard University in the Autumn of 1973 choosing mathematics and graduate level computer science courses. While at Harvard, he met fellow student Steve Ballmer, who would later succeed Bill Gates as Microsoft CEO. Bill Gates left Harvard after two years while Ballmer would stay and graduate magna cum laude.

Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard after two years to start a computer software company with friend Paul Allen. Which they name Micro-soft (later dropping the hyphen). Through technological innovation and aggressive business tactics Microsoft grew to become the world’s largest computer software company, in the process making Bill Gates the richest man in the world. (recently overtaken by Jeff Bezos of Amazon).

In 2007, 34 years after dropping out. William Henry Gates III returned to Harvard and delivered a powerful commencement speech to graduating students of the university.

Bill Gates Harvard Commencement Speech

Bill Gates went on to found the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 1994, since contributing more than $30 Billion to charity. In February 2014 Bill stepped down as chairman of Microsoft as he devoted most of his time to philanthropy.

Bill Gates will go down in history as one the most generous men to have ever lived. You can find his greatest quotes and advice below in Bill Gates 5 Rules of Success.

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