Written on the 13 June 2011 by Rachel Quilty, Personal Brand Strategist, Author and Speaker
What Oprah Winfrey Wants You to Know
As Oprah steps onto The Oprah Winfrey Show stage for the last time after 25 years , 4,561 days and nearly 30,000 guests later ; her goal is to share her greatest lessons and hopes for her viewers.
Personal branding is about seeing what you could be. However, one of the biggest lessons Oprah learnt was to that God sees more.. Take the time to watch the video.
Oprah showed us that:
- You have the power to change your own life
- You are not alone
- You can be yourself
- You can be more than what you are right now
Oprah told us that:
- You have a calling
- Your job is to figure out your calling and get on with it
- There is something you are meant to be doing passionately
- You should live from your heart
- Know what sparks the light in you
- And you can illuminate your world
- You have a platform, a sphere of influence
- Your stage is where your power lies
- Embrace your calling now and carry it forward
- Let your life speak for you
- And know your life is speaking to you - listen to the voice
- You will receive in direct proportion to how you give
- Everything you do - is done to you.
- You is responsible for your life
- You are responsible for the energy that you create for yourself
- You're responsible for the energy that you bring to others
- You are worthy
- You are worthy enough to own the life you were created for
- Know you are worthy of happiness
- You being alive makes worthiness your birthright
- You alone are enough
- everyone shares a common desire with you – to be heard and validated
- And what you say matters
- Learn what love is
- And you can be safe harbor for somebody else
- Connect. Embrace. Liberate. Love somebody.
- Always see the best in yourself
What Oprah learnt:
- nothing but the hand of God has made this possible
- I've never been alone, and you haven't either
- That that presence, that flow—some people call it grace—is working in my life at every single turn.
- It is yours for the asking
- I have felt the presence of God my whole life
- I could feel the voice bigger than myself speaking to me, and all of us have that same voice. Be still and know it.
- It's always there speaking to you and waiting for you to hear it in every move, in every decision.
- I wait and listen for the guidance that's greater than my meager mind.
- So what I know is, God is love and God is life, and your life is always speaking to you.
- Whispers are always messages, and if you don't hear the message, the message turns into a problem.
- I understand the manifestation of grace and God, so I know that there are no coincidences.
- I learned what love is.
- Gratitude is the single greatest treasure I will take with me from this experience.
- Start embracing the life that is calling you and use your life to serve the world.
Watch and Learn From Oprah Winfrey:
The following is an extract from The Oprah Winfrey Show finale expanding on the above important lessons that Oprah wished to share with her audience. Go to www.Oprah.com for full transcript.
You are not alone
This show always allows people, hopefully, to understand the power they have to change their own lives. And the common thread of each show - is the message that you are not alone.
"The first week The Oprah Winfrey Show went national, Oprah received a letter from a woman named Carrie in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Carrie said, 'Oprah, watching you be yourself makes me want to be more of myself.'
You can be yourself
Oprah’s hope was to encourage you to be more of yourself.
It wasn’t just a job. The show allowed me to see myself in you and you in me. I became your surrogate—to ask the questions, deliver the answers, learn, grow, expand my thinking, challenge my beliefs and the way I looked at the world. I listened and grew, and I know you grew along with me.
You were the teacher and the student
Oprah’s shared her lessons with the world. “It is no coincidence that I always wanted to be a teacher and I ended up in the world's biggest classroom. “
"What I knew for sure from this experience with you is that we are all called. Everybody has a calling, and your real job in life is to figure out what that is and get about the business of doing it.
Every time we have seen a person on this stage that is a success in their life, they spoke of the job, and they spoke of the juice that they receive from doing what they knew they were meant to be doing.
Because that is what a calling is. It lights you up and it lets you know that you are exactly where you're supposed to be, doing exactly what you're supposed to be doing. And that is what I want for all of you and hope that you will take from this show. To live from the heart of yourself. You have to make a living; I understand that. But you also have to know what sparks the light in you so that you, in your own way, can illuminate the world."
You have a Platform
Each one of you has your own platform. Do not let the trappings here fool you. Mine is a stage in a studio, yours is wherever you are with your own reach, however small or however large that reach is. Maybe it's 20 people, maybe it's 30 people, 40 people, your family, your friends, your neighbors, your classmates, your classroom, your co-workers. Wherever you are, that is your platform, your stage, your circle of influence. That is your talk show, and that is where your power lies.
In every way, in every day, you are showing people exactly who you are. You're letting your life speak for you. And when you do that, you will receive in direct proportion to how you give in whatever platform you have.
Carry whatever you're supposed to be doing, carry that forward and don't waste any more time. Start embracing the life that is calling you and use your life to serve the world."
You have a responsibility
Nobody but you is responsible for your life. It doesn't matter what your mama did; it doesn't matter what your daddy didn't do. You are responsible for your life. ... You are responsible for the energy that you create for yourself, and you're responsible for the energy that you bring to others. Oprah has as sign saying, 'Please take responsibility for the energy you bring into this space.'
All life is energy and we are transmitting it at every moment. We are all little beaming little signals like radio frequencies, and the world is responding in kind.
Newton's third law of motion says for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. That is the abiding law that I live by. It is the Golden Rule to the 10th power."
It was a revelation to all of us how much dysfunction there was in people's lives. The show, allowed us to drop the veil on all the pretense and do exactly what we envisioned in that first show: to let people know that you are not alone.
You are worthy
"I learned from the guests on this show, no need to feel superior to anybody. Because whether it's heroin addiction or gambling addiction or shopping addiction or food addiction, work addiction, the root is all the same. The show has taught me there is a common thread that runs through all of our pain and all of our suffering, and that is unworthiness. Not feeling worthy enough to own the life you were created for. Even people who believe they deserve to be happy and have nice things often don't feel worthy once they have them.
"There is a difference, you know, between thinking you deserve to be happy and knowing you are worthy of happiness.
Do Not Block Your Blessings
"What I got was we often block our own blessings because we don't feel inherently good enough or smart enough or pretty enough or worthy enough. The show has taught me you're worthy because you are born and because you are here. Your being here, your being alive makes worthiness your birthright. You alone are enough."
"I've talked to nearly 30,000 people on this show, and all 30,000 had one thing in common: They all wanted validation. If I could reach through this television and sit on your sofa or sit on a stool in your kitchen right now, I would tell you that every single person you will ever meet shares that common desire. They want to know: 'Do you see me? Do you hear me? Does what I say mean anything to you?'
"Understanding that one principle, that everybody wants to be heard, has allowed me to hold the microphone for you all these years with the least amount of judgment. But it's helped me to stand and to try to do that with an open mind and to do it with an open heart. It has worked for this platform, and I guarantee you it will work for yours. Try it with your children, your husband, your wife, your boss, your friends. Validate them. 'I see you. I hear you. And what you say matters to me.'"
You are Not Alone
"People often ask me, “What is the secret of success of the show? How have we lasted 25 years?” I non-jokingly say, 'My team and Jesus.' Because nothing but the hand of God has made this possible for me ... I know I've never been alone, and you haven't either. And I know that that presence, that flow—some people call it grace—is working in my life at every single turn. And yours too, if you let it in. It's closer than your breath, and it is yours for the asking.
"I have felt the presence of God my whole life. Even when I didn't have a name for it, I could feel the voice bigger than myself speaking to me, and all of us have that same voice. Be still and know it. You can acknowledge it or not. You can worship it or not. You can praise it, you can ignore it or you can know it. Know it. It's always there speaking to you and waiting for you to hear it in every move, in every decision. I wait and I listen. I'm still—I wait and listen for the guidance that's greater than my meager mind.
"The only time I've ever made mistakes is when I didn't listen. So what I know is, God is love and God is life, and your life is always speaking to you. First in whispers ... It's subtle, those whispers. And if you don't pay attention to the whispers, it gets louder and louder. It's like getting thumped upside the head, like my grandmother used to do. ... You don't pay attention to that; it's like getting a brick upside your head. You don't pay attention to that, the whole brick wall falls down. That's the pattern I've seen in my life, and it's played out over and over again on this show.
"What I've gleaned from this show: Whispers are always messages, and if you don't hear the message, the message turns into a problem. And if you don't handle the problem, the problem turns into a crisis. And if you don't handle the crisis, then disaster. Your life is speaking to you. What is it saying?" Hear your own life speaking to you.
Your Life Is Speaking To You
"You all have been a safe harbor for me for 25 years. It's strange, I know, but you have been. And what I hope is that you all will be that safe harbor for somebody else—their safe place to fall. Do for them what you all are telling me the show has done for you. Connect. Embrace. Liberate. Love somebody. Just one person. And then spread that to two. As many as you can. You'll see the difference it makes.
I want you to know that what you have to say matters to me. I understand the manifestation of grace and God, so I know that there are no coincidences. There are none. Only divine order here.
From you whose names I will never know, I learned what love is. You and this show have been the great love of my life."
"Every single day I came down from my makeup room on our Harpo elevator, I would offer a prayer of gratitude for the delight and the privilege of doing this show. Gratitude is the single greatest treasure I will take with me from this experience. The opportunity to have done this work, to be embraced by all of you who watched, is one of the greatest honors any human being could have.
Always See What You Could Be
And I thank each of you for allowing me to speak in such a way that, no matter what was happening in your life, you could see the best of your selves.
Authors Note: Personal branding is seeing what you could be. Oprah encourages you to always see the best in yourself.
Brand Yourself! And Jump the Q! Your personal brand should reflect your abilities and potential. Rachel Quilty, Personal Brand Strategist, known as ‘the Authority’ on personal branding and author of must- have book ‘Brand Yourself’. Go to http://www.JumptheQ.com.au for FREE strategic branding tips. Rachel encourages Jump the Q clients to think strategically when developing a personal brand to get that job offer, gain that promotion or win that client.
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