My Introduction - Better Late Than Never

Alright, I guess this should have been my first Blog post, but I never did do things the accepted way. I should introduce myself and give you an idea of the type of content that you can expect to read here.

My name is Collin McKnight, I know my Blog says Colli. It was an oops from an auto populate menu and I cannot undo it unless I email Steemit and cancel and then reopen my account. Way too much trouble for a simple title at this point. Anyway, I am a motivational speaker these days and a lot of what I write is along those lines. Now, allow me to clarify, I am not a “wind beneath my wings” type motivational speaker. I do my best to keep everything I send out grounded and simply open people’s eyes to a different way of viewing their current situations and the events in their lives so that hopefully they will not spend the years that I did angry with no escape from the prison that they place themselves in with that anger.

I am a former police officer, a veteran of the U.S. Navy, the product of the raising of a hardworking, alcoholic father and an enabling mother, a biological father who signed away all rights to me the moment he learned of my mother’s pregnancy, childhood abduction and molestation, a single full-time father to an amazing yet challenging son and a good bit more. I have been asked how exactly I am so normal after having lived through the things that I have and all I can say is this. Be careful with that word, Normal. I am not normal, but then again, who is? I spent a long time wasting my life on anger and resentment, in fact, I spent my life from the age of 13 until I was about 35 angry with my parents for their roles in certain events or their inaction on certain events, I was angry at my sisters for being the favorites (they were and will gladly and proudly admit it as will my parents) and then one day I realized something. My being angry had absolutely zero impact on them, at least not the kind I wanted. My family did not want to be around me much despite the fact that I was a productive member of society that loved them, even through the anger. I made them miserable and to be honest, I made myself miserable.

One day I was sitting there watching my son play with Legos and I started thinking back to when I was him. A ball of creativity and energy whose biggest goal in life was to be loved and to see my parents smile. Back to when I wanted to make my parents proud and that was all that mattered at the end of the day. What great days those were for many of us, life was so much simpler wasn’t it? I found that I missed those days at some level, though I never was able to make my parents proud of me, and it hit me that I could not and would not be that way with my son. He deserved better from me and being as angry as I was and as resentful as I was I was actually surrounding him with negativity that would stay with him for a lifetime. That seemed to tap into something that each and everyone of us has somewhere deep inside. It is a place of inner peace that we tend to lock away and build an almost impenetrable wall around. Once that is done we begin to harden our hearts and make it impossible for anyone to really get to know us, making it impossible for us to really know ourselves and ultimately preventing us from living the fullest lives that we can. I told myself right then and there that I would not be like that anymore and for whatever reason it worked. What I had touched was so deep and so profound that it resonate through my entire mind and psyche and while I did not find some miraculous ability to forgive many things I was able to let go of the anger and begin looking at almost every event in my life, both past and present, in a new way.

I took that and put it into practice on a daily basis and while it came fairly easily I found that there were still a lot of days that it was actual work to do so. The happiness that I had found within myself and the visible positive impact that this change had made on my son and all those in my life made the effort well worth the challenge and so I stuck with it. I began working backwards through my life, looking at every negative event and trying to put myself in the shoes of those I had been angry at in an effort to understand what they could have been thinking or feeling and why they took the actions that they did. It worked very well and that led me down my path to becoming a motivational speaker.
I speak to a lot of high school students and college students, but I also speak to adults and businesses as the lessons that I learned translate to all areas of life. I love feeling like I am helping others and when I hear from someone that was in the audience and they say how I helped them, even if it is just a little bit, I feel that I have served my purpose. I have spent my adult life serving others, as a member of the Navy and as a Police Officer and when physical injury ended both of those worlds I felt useless, empty and helpless and I was wrong. I was simply forced to take a hard look at my life and redirect to a new and more rewarding path.

Anyway, there is my introduction. I will do my best to share motivational stories and advice with those who read my posts in the hopes that somewhere in the words you will find a spark of inspiration. After that, it is up to you to fan that spark and start the blaze, but feel free to return anytime you find that fire waning and I will do my best to help you get it raging again. Until the next time please take this thought with you.

The world is full of terrible and tragic events, media broadcasting the worst things that they can and terrible people performing unspeakable atrocities. The world has a lot of negativity blaring, filling our televisions, radios and newspapers. Each one of us has our own voice and most of us our decent people so with that in mind, do good and do it loud. Turn up your own volume and use your positive strength to change your world. If you improve the day for just one person in your life every day, even in a tiny way, what would the world be like? Get out there and change the world one random act at a time, it takes very little to make a massive impact.