A personal message from Scott Gallagher
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My name is Scott Gallagher, and I’m the founder of the Run4RKids movement. We are holding our 4th Annual Indoor Marathon, Ultramarathon, 30K and Kids Runs Event scheduled for January 4th 2014. This year, we have something special that we want to accomplish. We want the proceeds to be sufficient for us to have our own Program Coordinator and Facilitator-in-Training, Michael Mekhail, co-present our Choice Centered Leadership program curriculum for youth to select schools right here in Ontario. The Choice Centered Leadership programs are custom designed to help support kids on many levels. You can see Michael in the top video clip on the right introduce me to deliver a customized keynote to addicted first nations kids at a school we visited in Winnipeg this past September. Let me tell you what makes Michael Mekhail so special. I've been delivering both my school and my corporate programs for over 7 years. During that time, I have worked with so many amazing people that wanted to help share my message of unconditional love and acceptance. However, I never had anyone that I felt had the right heart and motivation to be worthy of my investing my time in them. That is, until I met Michael. Here is how I first met Michael. A comprehensive program like mine requires a large number of staff and interns to be successful. I have a few people that recruit and manage our interns, and I don’t usually have the opportunity to work directly with any of them. One of our managers came to me telling me about this particular guy who was doing some volunteer graphic design work. I have worked with a large number of designers over time, and there was something about this person’s ability to communicate in pictures and colours that was better than anyone I’d worked with. My gut told me that there was something special about him, and my spirit was telling me to reach out to him. I decided to thank him by offering one of my $2k, 4-hour career and life coaching sessions. During that session, I found out that Michael, when he was in school, was the “poster child” of the kind of kids we help. He lived, and continues to live, in the projects. He and his family struggle with money, and he was consistently bullied at school. Like many marginalized kids, he was at risk for becoming self-destructive and addicted. But what I found was startling. Michael’s form of self-destruction was to be addicted to helping people, to being a people pleaser, and saying “Yes!” to everyone. I have never met anyone that was so humble, and wanted so much to help other people. After our session, I gave Michael a job referral to a friend of mine who is a multimillion dollar Real Estate Marketing guru, who immediately hired Michael. Within weeks, Michael was making more money than he had ever before. But in his heart, he felt something missing. He approached me and said he wanted to come and work with me and be mentored by me as an entrepreneur, even though I couldn’t pay him a salary. He sacrificed a well-paying, secure job that would have taken him far in terms of material gains, to volunteer with me so he could make a real difference with kids, share his story, and spare them the hardships of feeling unworthy that he experienced. His constant desire to please people came from a deep sense of feeling unworthy and incomplete. Michael was completely committed to helping us spread our message of unconditional love and acceptance to kids and businesses. He was willing to do anything from graphic design to working the phones to helping deliver our programs; he was willing to do anything that would help impact these kids. I have been approached by a number of people in the past that were interested in learning everything behind my programs, and carrying on my work. Remember that I have developed great interview and people-reading skills from my 15 years in corporate recruiting and owning the Executive Network. I always felt like the people that approached me about being mentored, had more to do with ego, and getting something for themselves by being the onstage persona, than from being a complete person wanting to show unconditional love and acceptance to these kids. I immediately recognized Michael’s unselfish, pure heart, and I began to see him as part of my legacy for my Choice Centered Leadership programs. I always knew that if anything ever happened to me, my work would stop. And I knew that Michael would be the one, if I gave him everything I could, he could take over for me and teach others and carry on my work if anything ever happened to me, and deliver it work with the full spirit and integrity of the design and the spirit that’s behind all my work. Michael has become my protégé. To fully understand what a giving, wonderful person Michael is I’ll tell you what he did for me recently as well as some lucky at-risk kids in Winnipeg. Let me preface by explaining there is a school in Winnipeg whose student population is 80% First Nation, and has a very large number of marginalized kids. In fact, that school has a therapy building right next door where most of these kids live. Most of them have no parents, live with some sort of addiction, and have been to treatment centres and jail. Whenever there is a crime in the area, the police will almost always come to this school first to find out what who knows what from the school. They are looking at poverty and despair with no way out. This school had been requesting our program for the past 6 years and we were able to find a foundation to fund 75% of the full curriculum of programs. For the 2 months prior to the program, which we delivered in September, Michael took it upon himself to work full time, with no experience in sales or marketing, to find some way to fund the remaining 25% for this school. While he wasn't successful getting outside funding to make up the difference, he gave it his all. Even though he was scared being on the phone, and being confronted, he just kept on trying, right up until the day before we traveled to Winnipeg. After seeing Michael's valiant effort, I decided to make up the difference and sponsor the remaining 25% myself as an in-kind gift. We brought Michael with us to Winnipeg to help with the program. Now, one of the things I have found out over the many years of delivering my programs, is that I try to schedule these programs around a marathon. There is something about running a marathon that really clears my head and puts me in the right spiritual, unconditional love and giving mindset to really impact these kids. But I had a challenge. I am not at my most fit, and I am not a great runner. and if I run a marathon with 1,000 people in it, I’m likely to be in the final 20. This marathon in Winnipeg had only about 40 runners in it, so I realized that I would be running alone for most of the race, and they had a 6-hour cutoff for the race. Running alone, I might not finish the marathon in time. Michael realized that having me not be able to finish the marathon could have a negative affect on the program, so he insisted on doing the marathon with me side by side. Note that while Michael is a healthy young man, he is not a runner, and had not been training to run a marathon. Yet, in order to support me in giving my best program, he walked and ran the marathon with me. He didn’t even have proper shoes. He even injured his foot during the race, and he didn’t let me know about it until we got back to Toronto. He hid it from me because he didn’t want to put anything negative in my head that could affect the kids. |
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During the marathon, we created his keynote presentation that would introduce me. Even though he was scared to speak publicly, he was willing to do anything that would help the kids.
My program requires a minimum of 2-4 adults who are seen by the kids as part of the school community, to participate equally with kids, doing the program themselves for their own reasons.
Unfortunately, this school failed to attract the minimum of 2 adult participants required for the program’s success. So I told Michael that we absolutely needed 2 adults, so the program was on track to fail. We wouldn’t be able to deliver the 4-week follow up program. Then I got this really creative idea. I said “what if that second adult, Michael, was you? But they have to perceive you as part of the school community. The only way I can see that happening is if I got you to do the keynote presentation, and went out to lunch with the kids the day before the program is scheduled.”
Michael was scared to death, as he’d never spoken publicly before. After the marathon, and me teaching him how to do the keynote, he spent the next day creating a new power point slide presentation to go with it. He was up all night putting it together.
Despite his lack of experience, Michael’s love for these kids, and his heartfelt desire to make a difference in their lives really shone through, and his keynote address was a huge success! For the 4 weeks following the event, Michael is playing the role of an adult community member, doing the program with the kids, so the kids can be successful.
I cannot explain just how unconditionally loving Michael is, and the incredible impact he is having on those kids’ lives.
And now, I really want Michael’s greatness to play a more public role in leading and delivering our program to a school right here in Ontario.
Michael will be running in the Run4RKids Indoor 6-hour Ultramarathon. This time we hope he’ll train [[said with a smile]] so he doesn’t get injured. He’ll be doing his first 6-hour ultra. But we need his run to mean something to the children he so badly wants to help.
What I am asking from you, is to help us raise enough money to deliver that program. It is expensive, but the impact that it has on kids’ lives is worth 100 times what it costs. I am asking you, to help me raise enough money so that Michael can step up and play the role he deserves to play in helping these kids.
Thank you very much for all your help and support.
My program requires a minimum of 2-4 adults who are seen by the kids as part of the school community, to participate equally with kids, doing the program themselves for their own reasons.
Unfortunately, this school failed to attract the minimum of 2 adult participants required for the program’s success. So I told Michael that we absolutely needed 2 adults, so the program was on track to fail. We wouldn’t be able to deliver the 4-week follow up program. Then I got this really creative idea. I said “what if that second adult, Michael, was you? But they have to perceive you as part of the school community. The only way I can see that happening is if I got you to do the keynote presentation, and went out to lunch with the kids the day before the program is scheduled.”
Michael was scared to death, as he’d never spoken publicly before. After the marathon, and me teaching him how to do the keynote, he spent the next day creating a new power point slide presentation to go with it. He was up all night putting it together.
Despite his lack of experience, Michael’s love for these kids, and his heartfelt desire to make a difference in their lives really shone through, and his keynote address was a huge success! For the 4 weeks following the event, Michael is playing the role of an adult community member, doing the program with the kids, so the kids can be successful.
I cannot explain just how unconditionally loving Michael is, and the incredible impact he is having on those kids’ lives.
And now, I really want Michael’s greatness to play a more public role in leading and delivering our program to a school right here in Ontario.
Michael will be running in the Run4RKids Indoor 6-hour Ultramarathon. This time we hope he’ll train [[said with a smile]] so he doesn’t get injured. He’ll be doing his first 6-hour ultra. But we need his run to mean something to the children he so badly wants to help.
What I am asking from you, is to help us raise enough money to deliver that program. It is expensive, but the impact that it has on kids’ lives is worth 100 times what it costs. I am asking you, to help me raise enough money so that Michael can step up and play the role he deserves to play in helping these kids.
Thank you very much for all your help and support.