In Brendon Burchard’s book, The Millionaire Messenger, at the very end of the book, Brendon relays a story about a time when he was teaching. He was a professor at a community college teaching a class on public speaking. He tells this story about one of his students, Sarah, who religiously attended every day of class.  EXCEPT for the days where she was supposed to present. She missed every single opportunity to present to the class. About two-thirds of the way through the class, it became very apparent to Brendon that she had failed the class, but she still continued to come. She came every single day, then finals came up. Brendon posted the schedule for final presentations for the entire class and because Sarah had already flunked the class, he didn’t bother to schedule her presentation.

A couple of days later, he’s sitting in his office and Sarah comes in looking very sheepish. Looking down at the floor, she asks Brendon if she could do the final presentation. Brendon says to her, “Well Sarah, I know you haven’t given a presentation yet in the class and there’s no way that you can pass the class, so there really isn’t a point.” She replies to him, “I know I screwed up. I know I missed out on a large opportunity here, but I kept coming to class because being in your class really inspired me and I knew if I kept coming to class, if I kept listening to what you had to say, I would eventually find my breakthrough moment. I want to give my final presentation even though it’s not going to have an effect on my final grade.” Brendon reaches into his bag and pulls out the schedule and writes Sarah’s name in on the very last day of presentation finals.

The day comes up and to Brendon’s surprise, Sarah shows up for that day. Sarah gets up in front of the class and as she’s giving the presentation, she gets about two minutes in and stops. She stops long enough that it’s uncomfortable for Brendon, the class, and Sarah. Brendon can see the energy in Sarah draining from her body. A couple of minutes into it, one of the students in the class very quietly says, “Go ahead Sarah. You can do it.” With that, Sarah regains her energy, and she regains her presentation, finds her voice again.  What was supposed to be a 20 minute final presentation, ended up being a 40 minute presentation. When she was done, the class started to cheer and clap for her. She sheepishly walks away back to her desk and one of her friends in the class said, “I knew you could do it, Sarah. I knew you could do it,” and gets up out of her desk and gives her a great big hug. At that point, everybody in the class stands up to give her a standing ovation.

At the end of the class, Brendon is sitting at his desk. The class is cleared out by this point and he’s putting his papers, his folders, and everything back in his bag. Sarah comes walking back into the room. Looking down at the floor, she says to Brendon, “Thank you for believing in me. Nobody ever told me that my voice matters.”

I wanted to share that story with because that story has had a tremendous impact on me. It gives me goosebumps today just to relay it to you and I’m so honored to be able to relay Brendon’s story in that way. I want to tell you that YOUR VOICE MATTERS, whether it’s at home and you’re dealing with your children or your husband or your wife or you’re in business with somebody. You’re in a job working 40 hours a week. YOUR VOICE MATTERS. Don’t be afraid to speak up because you never know when you’re going to say just that right thing that is going to have a tremendous impact on the one person that needed to hear it that day.

YOUR VOICE MATTERS. You need to add that to your belief system. You need to add that to your incantations every day, to your gratitude list, whatever you do as part of your morning ritual. If you don’t have a morning ritual, start a morning ritual. It is one of the most powerful things you can do in your day.