So I pulled some strings… Tapped into my network… Hollered at some of my people and was able to get in touch with 4 historically significant people to give some graduation advice. Watch the video to see what I mean.

Ok ok ok, so maybe I played all of the parts in the video. I know right? I am a master of disguises. And accents.

Anyway…

You’re graduating. Congratulations! Do realize what that means? It means from here, right now, you must decide. Nobody else can do it for you. What will you have? Where will you go? What will you do? Who will you be?

I have seen it happen too many times. Students who are getting ready to graduate. They have all of these amazing ideas about what they will do, how they will conquer the world and do something that has never been done before but then something happens. They spend their first summer doing the same things they’ve done every summer before that. That slowly becomes the fall, where they do the same ting they’ve done every other fall. Eventually, they forget about the things they used to want to have and the places they used to want to go.

You are standing at the beginning of an incredible adventure where you get decide every part. Are you going to stand around and do the same things you’ve always done? or are you going to carve your own path? Find your own way? and Make Your Own Lunch?

Nobody else can decide this for you.

I hope that you take some time and plan what your future will look like. Decide that it’s realistic for you to have and then decide to get it, no exceptions.

You have spent the past few years to make it here, for this moment where you get to decide, for yourself, what you will do with your life.

Decide. Decide to Make Your Own Lunch.

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Starting from today, I will be uploading a new episode almost every Sunday.

There will be funny episodes, awkward episodes, serious episodes and episodes that will make you wonder why my mom allows me out in public.

Make sure to leave your comments on the video and share it!

PS If you want to make my dad as happy as he gets when he sees the free samples at Costco on a Saturday afternoon, join the MYOL Facebook group here -> www.facebook.com/makeyourownlunch

PPS Make sure to send these videos to your advisors/teachers/principals and World of Warcraft Guild

So I cleaned out my travel folder and found my airplane boarding passes from my 2009 travels and this picture is what happened when I dumped it out.  BAM!! (PS That’s a bout a third of them)

ANYWAYS…

The death threats and hate mail can stop. I am here to offer the reason of my recent absence.

Make Your Own Lunch TV. That’s right. I said it.

Beginning in February, this blog will be the new home of my video blog, Make Your Own Lunch TV. I am so stoked about this. MYOL TV is going to be a series of awesome, hilarious and insightful interviews with people who are making their own lunch. People who are living by their own set of rules and doing what they are passionate about.

Think graffiti artists, photographers, fashion designers, bloggers, skateboarders, and Leprechauns (I may or may not be lying about the Leprechauns). It’s going to be awesome.

A little more patience please and we will be good to go shortly.

In the meantime, browse the blog and catch up on any posts you might have missed like one of my personal favorites here or the one that caused Chuck Norris to quit his job and become a spoken word poet here.

Terry Fox.

Those two words are enough to make my chest burn and give me goosebumps. He is a real-life super hero.

When I am speaking with young people, I am constantly getting them to make 4 decisions.  The two hardest decisions to make are; decide what you want to do and who you want to be.

Many times, who you are is based on what you do.

I was going to write a huge blog entry about how to leave your mark and do extraordinary things. I was going to write about the things we can learn from Terry Fox but this video does it for me.

Take 8 minutes to watch this video. I give you permission to do it at school, at your office or while your girlfrend is trying to talk to you.

What will you do? And more importantly, who will you be?

Alright already! I have been getting a bunch of emails asking me to post the piece I wrote about Oprah-itis. So here it is in its literary glory.

Ok, let’s get one thing straight, I love Oprah. Don’t worry Stedman I don’t love her like that. She’s all yours. What I love is the fact that she’s created this huge empire off of helping people! She gives stuff away, she gives people makeovers, she cleans people’s houses, she builds schools in Africa, she grants wishes, she sends cupcakes to people and she gets other people involved and shows them how they can do it for themselves. She’s a huge example of how helping people, even in the easiest ways, can literally change the world. Plus, she likes to Skype.

She’s awesome!

What’s NOT awesome are the people suffering from ‘Oprah-itis’. No, this doesn’t mean they start hanging out with people named Gayle and start giving dishwashers away. It means they sit around and wait for things to get bad enough for ‘Oprah’ to come and save the day.

They wait for someone else to ‘make their lunch’.

They feel if they are fat enough, poor enough, dirty enough, ugly enough, unhealthy enough, mismanage their lives enough, have a tragic story or don’t clean their house for 18 years, that someone will magically come and save the day and possibly bring Dr. Oz to make them look younger.

WRONG.

Did you know that 20-25% of young people believe they will get rich from winning the lottery?!?! REALLY? One out of every 4 teens think they will win the lottery? Are you serious? That’s Oprah-itis.

We are living in a time in history where everyone is expecting a bailout.

You want to know who is going to make you rich? YOU. You want to know who is going to make sure you have what you want? YOU. You want to know who will get you your dream job? YOU. Your dream vacation? YOU. You wanna know who is going to make sure you are living the life you want.. Wait for it… Wait for it…

YOU.

Do you see a common theme? If you don’t, you might want to consider a lifelong career as a tetherball player.

YOU Make YOUR Own Lunch. Nobody is going to come through and surprise you with a perfect-life makeover complete with Smart car, Amazon Kindle and mini-Chihuahua.

If there is something you are unhappy with, decide how you’ll change it, decide that it’s realistic for you to change and then take the first step.

Let Oprah be Oprah. Let her change other people’s lives. You change yours.

Now I need to go, Oprah is on.

This is it. You asked for it so I deliver it, just like a pizza but with less garlic so you can still kiss someone after consuming it.

The Make Your Own Lunch™ blog.

This is the place for you to come and learn how you can Make Your Own Lunch™. (Psst, hey new guy, Make Your Own Lunch™ isn’t really about food… Click here to learn about it)

This blog is a place where you can learn about what other people have done to Make Their Own Lunch and how you can do the same. You’ll learn about travel, education, money, hygiene (if you have to pause to smell you shirt -and it smells like a Junior Whopper – I’m talking to you) and a lot of other cool stuff.

You wanna learn how you can volunteer in Thailand, working with sick elephants? That will be here here. You wanna know how I got the chance to move to Japan to teach English in the heart of Tokyo or how I backpacked across Europe and Central America? I will let you know how I did it. You wanna know how to make more money or land the part-time job you dream of? Cool, I will make sure we write about that. You wanna start your own business? Good news, that’s also going to be taken care of here.

You want something else? Email us and tell us what you want to know and we will get our team on it!

Aside from having all this awesome info, we’ll also post interviews with people who are Making Their Own Lunch and doing some really cool stuff (think surfing photographers, professional croquet players and scuba diving instructors) We will also post videos and pictures to show you that we aren’t lying about all this stuff!

Our goal is to write about the things that we are passionate about. For some of us it’s music and travel, for others it’s making money and staying healthy. Bottom line, we want to help you create an awesome life that you are excited about living! We want to help you Make Your Own Lunch™ and love every minute of it!!!

Check back often and make sure you join me on Facebook and Twitter.

Bon appétit!

–Ryan–