Today I just really wanted to hit on something, dealing with pain. I asked my mom one day, I said mom, I said can you buy me a deck of cards, she said “Junior, I don't gamble in my house. Ain't no cards coming on my house.” I said “Mom I don't need them for gambling, I don't want them for gambling I just need a deck of cards mom.”
My mom for years from the time I was 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. I never saw a women take so much physical abuse than the way i seen my mother beaten every frickin day of my life. But I can't help her because I'm not strong enough. I don't have the muscle to get this man off my mother.
My mothers a very high women and every time they hit her she would bleed from her eyes, she would walk around with sunglasses on in the house.
I said ma I need a deck of cards.
Last altercation we got in my step father hit my mama so hard in the face I caught him and I looked at him with this rage and this pain in my eyes like one day one day and I took this deck of cards, I couldn't live in the house so I had to live in the garage, and after this last altercation we had with this guy, I just ran to my garage and i grabbed this deck of cards and i flipped a 7 and I started doing 7 pushups. I flipped a 6 I did 6, I flipped a 9 I did nine, I flipped a 2 I did 2, I flipped a 9 again I did 9. I went through the whole deck jack, queen, king worth 10, aces 25 and jokers 50.
Until I got sick and tired of what pain felt like in my gut. It didn't even matter to me because I started shuffling them all up again and that's when I started doing my sit ups because I wanted to make sure sports wasn't the reason why I started training. It was to make sure a man never put his hands on my momma again.
And I told my momma no pain, no pain will ever stop me from taking care of you and my brothers and sisters. That's why I started doing what I started doing. Sports was a byproduct of what people started to see. It was the behind the scenes that was driving me crazy.
There's two sides of pain that I think a lot of people really don't understand. There's one side of pain thats the suffering and discomfort side of pain.
Then there's another side of pain that's called effort - its called glory, It’s called if you can find a way to push through pain there's something greater on the other side of it and if you never tap into it, it’s because the first time you felt it you backed off. The first time you felt that burn, it’s too much.
We rationalizing with ourselves to where we automatically stop. That's why a bunch of us give up on so much in life so quickly. That's why kids have a problem finishing things in today's time, because as soon as they feel a small bit of discomfort, or things ain't right, they gone. I can't do it anymore.
But suppose I told you, the greatest pain of my life, is the reason I'm standing here today.
I dare you to take a little pain. To go through it. You're not gonna die because you’re feeling a little pain. You ain't gonna die. At the end of pain is success. Pain is temporary it may last for a minute, an hour a day, or even a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place.
If I quit however it will last forever.
On the other side of that pain, on the other side of that pain, on the other side of that pain, is your promise. 15 years old, I picked up these deck of cards and one day I counted them and I found out there was 52 of them in a deck of cards. 52, and I took my greatest pain, into my business, with the greatest achievement ever, touching that trophy.
52 cards, and ironically my number ended up being 52.