Chamber welcomes RHS a cappella group, motivational speaker at partnership breakfast

Chamber welcomes RHS a cappella group, motivational speaker at partnership breakfast

(ROCKWALL, TX – April 6, 2017) Some groovy tunes performed by the Rockwall High School Walk the Line A Cappella Choir and an engaging talk by master motivational speaker Delatorro McNeal II were the highlights of the Rockwall Chamber Quarterly Partnership Breakfast on Thursday, April 6.

Presented by Star Transit, the breakfast event saw folks enjoy breakfast tacos inside Fuzzy’s Taco Shop in Rockwall along with a special performance by the RHS a cappella group, which was recently recognized as one of the top eight a cappella groups in the nation. Having won the Varsity Vocals International Championship of High School A Cappella (ICHSA) semi-final competition at Marcus High School, Walk the Line will travel to New York on April 20-23 to compete for the ICHSA National Title. The Chamber welcomed donations from those in attendance at the breakfast to help fund Walk the Line’s journey to New York.

Internationally renowned motivational speaker Delatorro McNeal shared five simple principles for becoming more successful in business and in life – purpose, potential, pain, passion and power.

McNeal said before he was born, his father lost the use of his lower extremities after being shot twice in the back during his military service in Vietnam, and his mother was told that her birth canal was too narrow for her to have children.

“I’m a medical impossibility, I’m not supposed to be here. But I’m grateful that purpose precedes plans,” he said. “Every single one of us were dropped on this Earth for a reason and with a reason, and I believe that the moment we begin to operate in purpose rather than focusing purely on profit or personal gain, we can grow to the next level.”

McNeal said the second principle, potential, exists in the gap between where you are and where you want to be, and that you are your only true competition. “We’re always spending money we don’t have to buy things we don’t need to impress people we don’t even like, all because we’ve been taught to keep up with ‘the Joneses.’ We are constantly competing with other folks, and we forget to compete against ourselves.”

McNeal said once he learned about potential at a young age, he went on to eventually earn a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree – two degrees in five years – from Florida State University, with a 4.0 GPA and zero student loan debt. He came out to Dallas to work for Andersen Consulting, but was laid off after just one year with the company. He said he went from making $50,000 a year to nothing in one day, and he still owed back his $5,000 signing bonus because he hadn’t been with the company for two years. That’s when he learned the third principle – pain.

“Life will hand you pain if you want to be a high achiever. Extraordinary accomplishments do not come without an extraordinary challenge. But at the end of the day our setbacks are nothing but a setup for our comebacks, and the most challenging things you’ve ever been through are sent as a gift to make you remarkable,” McNeal said.

It was during those painful setbacks and hard times that McNeal said he realized his heart was still beating, and that’s when he learned the fourth principle called passion. To be an extraordinary business professional, he said, one has to have passion not only for what they do for a living, but also for who they are as a person. “Take the word passion and slow it down: pass-I-on. How do you pass yourself on to other people? Your brand is not your titles or business slogans, it’s the aura you leave in the room when you exit. That’s your passion. People are going to sum up your life in one word, and that’s your passion.”

McNeal said another principle one should identify within themselves is their superpower.  “No matter what your business is, no matter what your industry is, you walk around every day as a superhero. The question is what superpower do you have, and how do you use that superpower to let your light shine before man, let them see what you’re doing, and give God credit for it?

“I’m not a pastor, I don’t have a congregation. But every time I take the stage I get a chance to impact audiences all around the world, and I let my light shine. And people come up to me all the time and say, ‘There’s something different about you.’ That difference is that light.”

By Austin Wells, Blue Ribbon News. 

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