I was given an assignment: Check out Les Brown motivational speeches on YouTube. I found the following video. Very motivational. I liked it. I was already familiar with Les Brown because his motivational speeches are used by multi-level marketing educational material. Mis-spent youth...don't ask. His encourgement and perspective is helpful more now than ever. What sticks out to me most now is how much of the Bible he sneaks in. He is telling the truth. But instead of directly referring to Jesus he refers to "the universe". Also I am uncomfortable with so much of his message being centered on the individual's free will and decisions with very little attention given to God's sovereignty and providence.
I was very interested to know what Les Brown's religion and views. I wanted to know what Les Brown sees as the difference between being a motivational speaker and being a preacher of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I found the following the video that begins to answers my question.
The thing is I agree with what he is doing...almost completely. He is not talking about finding salvation but finding success in this life. The only problem is that although we need to act and align ourselves according to our purpose, how do we know what that purpose is? Who chooses our purpose? You or God? Some people find that purpose even without being religious, but I believe they are still being directed by God. What do you think? Comment below.
Back in 2008 Warner Brothers released a straight-to DVD movie called Batman:Gotham Knight in 2008 at about the same time they released the feature Dark Knight in theaters. Gotham Knight is an anthology of six short movies exploring Batman's world from the perspective of Anime. Each story is different. Even the art is different in style for each story. The only thing that really connects all the stories is the voice of the late great Kevin Conroy as the voice of Batman/Bruce Wayne.
One of the best stories is found in the fifth story. What I liked about it was that in the story we get flash backs of the time in Batman's life when as a young man he travelled the world learning all the skills he needed to learn. The story was about when Batman is injured and needs to call Alfred, his Butler, to pick him up. As Batman made his way to the point in the sewer he would rendevous with Alfred, Batman has flashbacks to the time he went to a woman somewhere in Asia to learn how to control pain. While Batman was interested in learning how to control physical pain but his teacher's goal was trying to teach him how to handle and heal the trauma that drove him to become Batman. When he had learned what he came for, Batman's teacher sent him away but she said that she failed to help him.
Below is a clip of the last two minutes in the story when Batman reaches the point he is supposed to meet Alfred he finds a bunch of illegal guns strewn about the sewer tunnel. Batman tries to gather the guns in his arms when Alfred reaches down from the street level so Batman can take his hand and be saved, Batman says "I can't." Why? Because he cannot let go of the guns. The guns represent the trauma that birthed Batman - the death of the Waynes, his parents gunned down in front of him as a child. That is great illustration of how in the depths of emotional pain we sometimes hold on to the pain instead of letting it go and being free of it.
One of the best things about art like this is that it lends itself to multiple interpretations and views. Feel free to leave yours in the comments. Also check the links below to stream the movie and the Wikipedia article for more information.
