Meeting Dan Clark, Speaker/Author/Songwriter/Former Professional Football Player

I just returned from a fabulous couple of days at Snowbird with my family. My husband, Matt was participating at The Corporate Alliance Reunion for business owners (200 people) and we joined him for the last day and to hang out up there as a family after it concluded. We’re both members of Corporate Alliance and have generated a stronger network because of it. Excellent people! Excellent programs!

I attended the closing event with guest speaker, Dan Clark and we were privileged to sit at his table for dinner. I told Dan about Startup Princess and he said he loved our tagline, Make a Wish, Make it Happen and that he’d love to speak to our group…that would be awesome someday!

I’ve heard many, many speakers in my life and while Dan doesn’t really like to be called a “motivational speaker” (he prefers to say he’s a speaker who helps you “remember” because he doesn’t really teach you anything new), I would say that Dan is in my top 10 favorites of all time…he’s really great! Dan used to play football professionally, has had a successful music songwriting career, and now he’s an author (one of the “Chicken Soup for The Soul” writers) and speaker–he spoke in 51 cities and over 20 countries last year. He’s upbeat, funny, and encourages you to think that sometimes the answers “are in the box.” He reminded us that music only has 12 notes (with sharps and flats) yet think of the vast differences of compositions and styles–there are core elements and yet with creativity and effort you can make it yours. He said there’s a reason that there are basics and core principles of success…they are tried and tested over and over.

Today‘s Magic Wand: One story he shared that was very interesting was the difference between one year’s last place (Florida ?) football team and first place Dallas Cowboys football team was in how they answered 1 question. He asked each member of the team “Why are you here?” The losing team all said, “To play football.” but the winning team replied, “To Win the Super Bowl.” They were both “teams” but one had a purpose, a mission. Its not enough to just “do what you do”, you have to have a vision for why it is you’re doing “what you do.”