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[Music]
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hi come on the last guy who do a little
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better no hi it's great to be with you
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guys it's been a two-year process for me
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and I wouldn't have it any other way
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it's funny when I got talking with
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Antoine we started talking about TV
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shows you know we all TV shows that we
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liked we were kids right yeah me I was
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into MacGyver yeah remember him I think
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there's some younger people here so just
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stick with me I'll tell you about him
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he's a great show every single Sunday
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9:00 p.m. I'd be on the couch waiting
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for the show to start and every single
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Sunday there was no situation that this
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guy couldn't free himself from and every
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single Sunday I was blown away no
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obstacle he couldn't overcome and just
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when you thought it was over that this
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was the end he'd use a paperclip and
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chewing gum to stop a speeding train
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pretty amazing right the obvious
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solution for many of us week after we
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keep being a life-and-death situation
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where he innovates or he dies he never
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died maybe inspired by MacGyver for the
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last 16 years I've been working with
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companies and their teams to innovate
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innovation is defined as a significant
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positive change could be technological
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could be in your finances your career
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even a relationship but it's not just a
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little better version of what you
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already have it's meaningful it's
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transformational it's even exponential
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change for the better and about three
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years ago after working with hundreds of
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startups and big companies I made a
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discovery it's not about money
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it's not about who you know it's not
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even about being in the right place at
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the right time it is about discomfort
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it's about embracing not just accepting
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discomfort even in actual emergency to
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innovate it's on the other side of that
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uneasiness that pain that anxiousness
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even embarrassment that breakthrough
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innovation is waiting like I ever knew
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that I remember being seven years old
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watching season 1 episode 7 was a rerun
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and in it MacGyver is locked in a
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commercial freezer by the bad guys
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imagine your MacGyver your MacGyver your
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MacGyver your kind of MacGyver
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what do you do well he's got moments to
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live so he breaks off a piece of the
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rack from around the freezer he lines it
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up between the light and the door lock
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and he uses the light to melt ice down
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that rack into the door lock where it
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freezes and breaks the door open he did
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it again these are the moments that made
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MacGyver famous and you're probably not
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gonna find yourself locked in a
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commercial freezer although you know
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what to do now if you are what being
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locked in a freezer has got to be pure
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discomfort and life sometimes gives us
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discomfort and an opportunity for him a
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guy for a moment taking on Musk one of
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the most successful businessmen out
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there when he sold PayPal for a hundred
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and eighty million dollars he put a
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hundred million into SpaceX 70 million
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into Tesla and ten million into Solar
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City he had to borrow money for rent and
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now there's some of the most successful
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companies out there changing what's
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possible in the world he took all of
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that discomfort and turned it into
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success how well he purposefully locked
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himself in that metaphorical freezer and
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didn't give himself a choice he forced
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himself to have in MacGyver moment real
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MacGyver like discomfort career risking
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image risking reputation risking
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discomfort opens the door to
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transformational innovation personally
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and professionally the magnitude of risk
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is proportional to the breakthrough
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potential take Malala she was repeatedly
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threatened and even shot by the Taliban
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in Afghanistan for her activism
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now she's innovating women's access to
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education in the Middle East and all
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over the world
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that's discomfort and discomfort is our
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access to innovation and our own
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MacGyver moments
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sure MacGyver moments are highly
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uncomfortable to perform but they even
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can be uncomfortable to watch I mean
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watching somebody break the status quo
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with everything they are and everything
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they're not on the lines insane
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but when you see somebody stand up for a
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cause that's bigger than their own
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discomfort it is inspiring it's moving
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it's what people are talking about when
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they're talking about leading from the
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front they're speaking about putting
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yourself on the line for significant
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positive game innovation for the group
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just look at the leadership that musk
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Molalla and even people from history
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like Lincoln and Gandhi have provided
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now Plato said necessity is the mother
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of invention Edison said discontent is
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the first necessity of progress but I
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really knew I was on to something from
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something my mom said you know parents
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sometimes say these things that make
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sense to them but absolutely no sense to
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their kids and my mom was no different
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she would say things like it's cheaper
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to milk a cow than buy one what or don't
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take any wooden nickels still don't know
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what that means and the way out is
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through I think that was actually Robert
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Frost but to me it'll always be my mom
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and it's that one that makes so much
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sense to me now in order to get through
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something the freezer situations in our
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lives the hard things the things we want
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to change we need a MacGyver moment I
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was in exactly that position several
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years back no job out of cash anxious in
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public girlfriend broke up with me I
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think most people call that rock-bottom
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or maybe a country song depending on
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where you guys are from right
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I've sitting at the computer one day and
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my parents house which is where you live
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when you hit rock bottom and I get this
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email blast for a conference in
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Singapore and I'm about to delete it and
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that thing my mom says comes to mind the
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way out is through so with nothing more
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than an idea terrified to speak in
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public and few credentials I just email
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them back cold and I say why don't you
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have me speak best Stirling Wow I end up
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getting on the phone with the conference
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organiser and having nothing to lose
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negotiate a fee to speak at their
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conference in retrospect I had locked
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myself in a freezer in that metaphorical
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freezer and now I had to innovate myself
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the thing is we all have the capacity to
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do the things that we dream of doing but
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we don't who chooses to be uncomfortable
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so we wait we wait until the bad guys
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lock us in the freezer we wait until we
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have a heart attack to do something
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about our health we wait until we see
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that next great startup to realize ah I
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had that idea avoiding discomfort is the
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only thing between the linear
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incremental growth that we accept and
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quote living up to our potential in fact
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avoiding discomfort too long never works
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anyways for people or companies just
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take Kodak they hung their hat on print
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photography even though they were the
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first one to invent the digital camera
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they didn't have the organizational
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culture to embrace the discomfort
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necessary to bring that to market and
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other digital camera companies left them
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behind
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the best part about all of this though
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is it's not just my opinion it's
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grounded in biology our brains have
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evolved to keep us safe which from an
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evolutionary standpoint is genius avoid
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the things that are dangerous and we
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survive what our brains have also
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evolved to feel discomfort during
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periods of perceived stress when we
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embrace that stress that discomfort
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versus run from it our body's
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sympathetic nervous system uses that
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stress differently our heart races blood
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pumps adrenaline courses through our
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veins and new connections are made in
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the brain it's the biological equivalent
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of opening up the throttle on an engine
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and it's why under conditions of
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competition typical discomfort athletes
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can perform by as much as 12% above
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where they train pretty amazing right
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and we could talk about innovation and
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discomfort all day
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it would just add to the seemingly
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limitless knowledge potential out there
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they've never been so many podcasts
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audiobooks ebooks eCourse is school
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courses and certifications as there are
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today well when you think about it his
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knowledge really ever made the
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difference or maybe better said has
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knowledge without new action never made
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a difference knowledge without action
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doesn't provide for breakthroughs it
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would be like MacGyver sitting at his
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desk listening to a podcast unlocked
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picking reading a book about the physics
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of water and heat and I don't know
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trolling the internet looking for the
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latest tactics of bad guys he'd have a
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lot of knowledge but that knowledge
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doesn't get him anything there's no
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discomfort no opportunity for innovation
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but when he embraces being locked in
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that freezer disparate ideas that would
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probably never have a chance to come
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together do it's exactly because he's in
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an uncomfortable position that knowledge
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comes together with action and it
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crosses into the world of the unknown
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the complex the unseen chaos of
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potential all around us to create
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something new innovation August 28th
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1963 dr. Martin Luther King is standing
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on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial
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already representing something extremely
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unpopular at the time the civil rights
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movement the authorities told them to
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give a different speech and he agreed as
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he's standing there giving a different
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speech thankfully for him thankfully for
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all of us he had somebody that stood for
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him through that discomfort
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her name was Mahalia Jackson famous
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gospel singer his friend and she was on
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stage with him that day and she said to
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him and you can hear it in the
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recordings Martin tell them about your
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dream and the next four words out of his
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mouth we all know because we live inside
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of that innovation today he said I have
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a dream
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we all have dreams
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realizing those dreams takes confronting
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our own discomfort we tend to look at
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constraints hardships problems as
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something to rid ourselves from to avoid
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innovation is exactly the opposite it's
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going through those things to get to the
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other side we all have that capacity and
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we all know what some of those things
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are it's calling that relative you
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haven't talked to in a decade it's
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starting that company you've been
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thinking about forever it's giving that
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idea to your boss my mom said the way
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out is through today I invite you to go
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through become the kind of person that
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looks for the hard things the things
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other people avoid to find your MacGyver
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moments and become innovators its
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innovators who change their businesses
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its innovators who change their lives
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and its innovators who maybe even change
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the world
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[Applause]
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you
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[Applause]
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