The Unmotivational Motivational Speaker

As many of you know, my place of employment is a retirement home. Every couple of weeks or so, we have a motivational speaker come in to talk about whatever the hot issue is.

A couple of days ago, we had a paraplegic woman come in to talk about how, even with disabilities, a person can live a fulfilling life. A great idea in my opinion, as many if not all of the residents have some sort of dishabilitating illness or condition.

This motivational speaker, did everything but that.

(Note: The following post is not intending to offend anyone)

She set up her talk more like a musical then anything else. She would talk for a few minutes and then sing a song with her guitar.

The talks were absolutely depressing. I understand that losing the use of your legs would be an awful experience, but so is losing your memory. Or losing the ability to use more than just your legs.

She would take a seemingly sweet story, turn it into something needlessly horrific, and then would say at the end, "But that's ok, he's made the most of his life." And then she'd sing 'What a Wonderful World'.

Take the lovely friend she met, who also was a paraplegic. They were great friends, and they helped each other deal with their disability. He helped her see what she had in the world rather than what she had taken from her. It helped her to feel more normal, like everyone else. He has a lovely wife, and lovely kids who accept him just the same even though he is a little different. And then one day, he was crossing the street, and he was struck by a vehicle. His wheelchair was knocked over, and he landed on his shoulder, and he lost the use of that arm. And then, "Che, sera, sera, whatever will be, will be..."

Call me ignorant, call me insensitive, call me weird, just don't call me Sue, but I was not motivated whatsoever.

A motivational speaker should inspire us to do more with our lives, to strive for greater things, to go above and beyond what is expected of us. She should not regale us with extensive tales of how the doctor messed up her diagnosis, and then sing "How Much Is That Doggy In the Window".

But that's just my opinion. Thus the blog.