Saturday, I am walking around in some high weeds and as I look down into the underbrush I spot this dried up stick.  It was so crooked and deformed looking that it caught my eye and caused me to pause and take a closer look.  I probably took a dozen photos of this unusual and unique plant.  There were many of its cousins growing all around it, but this one was special.  It was not the strongest, nor the “prettiest”, and it was probably not chosen most likely to succeed.  But there was definitely something distinctive and memorable about its posture that I found intriguing.

                I am sure the same sort of thing could be said about me; he is not the strongest, not the most gifted and my name may never be in lights.  But I believe those sort of things are not prerequisites to having a rich and rewarding life.  In fact as I think back to my crooked little plant, it was not his strengths that drew my eye to him.  It was his uniqueness, his being one of kind, his originality, that caused me to tell his story tonight.  In spite of his odd shape he had a quality that I found irresistible; he was not afraid of being different, he embraced his distinctiveness.

                What I am about to say may come as a great shock to some of you, but I feel I must tell you.  We are different.  I told you that you would be shocked, but it is true.  Nobody is like me and there never has been anyone exactly like me.  I think like no other, I have a style that is all my own, there are things that I can do better than anyone, and if I do not do them, they will not get done.  And the same is true about you too; and that is a good thing.

                You are valuable and special because of your uniqueness.  You are an original masterpiece, rare and precious.  You may not be the richest, the “prettiest” or the strongest, but you are worth more than you realize.  You matter; you are important; people love you and you have a tremendous amount of potential.  Stop trying to be like everybody else and start being the person you were created to be.  You will find incredible freedom when you realize that it is not bad to be different and it is ok to just be yourself.  Dare to be what you are and to believe in your own individuality.

Something to think about:

• Why is it so many want to be what they’re not while what they are is what others want to be?

• To be one’s self, and unafraid whether right or wrong, is more admirable than the easy cowardice of surrender to conformity.

• To be nobody but yourself—in a world that is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else—means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight, and never stop fighting.

• It is our uniqueness that gives freshness and vitality to a relationship.

• Life wants a rich harmony, not a colorless uniformity.

• If I try to be like him, who will be like me?

• Every man knows well enough that he is a unique being, only once on this earth; and by no extraordinary chance will such a marvelously picturesque piece of diversity in unity as he is ever be put together a second time.

• Every human being is intended to have a character of his own; to be what no others are, and to do what no other can do.

Just like everybody else, I am different
Rickey Moore