Get Turboized!

I was a little apprehensive with taking 30 plus little kids to see a movie about being a turbo-powered snail! We do lots of big group events but usually not in a public setting like a movie theater. We ended up taking 40 to the movie and it turned out that we were the only ones in this big theater. Most of these kids don’t get to do much outside their home situation. It was awesome to see a movie that focused on the little guy actually being able to beat the big guy.

I didn’t know whether my little guys would be able to sit for a couple of hours to watch the movie. They have been raised in an instant generation where an attention span is about 5 minutes. Most are hooked on video games, Facebook or texting. So I was totally jazzed to see them get into the movie and be excited about a crazy little snail, who didn’t allow his friends and family to stop him from dreaming big, real big.

I know one of the biggest challenges in life, regardless of age; sex or background is having a sense of what life should be about. It is humorous watching a little snail watching the same clip of a famous racecar driver thinking that some day he can be just like this superstar. The difficulty is that most youth and 20 something’s of today don’t know how to dream or think outside the box much if at all. I know that dreaming and stepping out is at times learned from a parent, grandparent or special friend. Too often as we get older we choose what is safe and never take risks to experience life to the max.

It was hilarious watching my 87-year old father in-law jump out of a plane to proof his masculinity. I know that my mother in-law was very apprehensive with having him put on a parachute and actually jump out at 10,000 feet. Looking back I’m sure he would say it was a piece of cake and no biggy. I got a sense that while he was signing the liability waiver that it was a big deal. Watching the guy repack the parachute was really scary thinking that if he messed up what might happen at 10,000 feet.

I know that the leadership gurus are so quick to talk about dreaming; taking risks and making something happen that is unexpected. This is all great talk but takes a different environment for this to actually take place when you don’t have any role models in your life. I know that it is so easy to always play it safe in life. You won’t get hurt if you don’t take any risks. No one wants to purposely stick out their necks to have them chopped off. It is so easy to talk yourself out of doing something that is outside the box.

Our little snail in the movie starts to picture in his mind’s eye what it would be like to live in the real world and push himself to do something that seems impossible. It is rather hilarious to see a group of snails think they are going to race and more interesting to see our turbo charged snail take on his super racer hero. The awesome learning curve from this silly movie is seeing a group of friends choose to back another friend in taking a risk to improve their situation. What’s even crazier is to see the bigger than life taco guy go to extremes to get his little friend snail get into the Indy 500.

We can sit back and laugh at this funny well crafted movie but the reality is that for most of my younger kids watching they are like the snail before he was turbo charged. They can be afraid to ask for help or definitely not willing to take a risk where everyone can laugh at them as they fail. So how do we go from normal to turbo charged? How do we go from being laughed at to being admired for going the extra mile? Is it possible to face the biggest obstacle in life and actually blow it out of the water?

As the movie finished my group of little guys all started to clap and scream GO TURBO. My hope is that they too can be turbo charged in their lives by dreaming, living out their dreams and not being afraid to do the impossible right now!