Shah Rukh Khan: I Was Extremely Ugly

Shah Rukh Khan - Live Your Dream

Powerful speech by Bollywood super star Shah Rukh Khan at the University of Edinburgh about embracing the gift of life and to live out your dreams.

Transcript:

Sat me down and told me I was extremely ugly and being ugly necessarily meant, I do bad guy roles. I wasn't a romantic hero types he said. Actually, he used the words that my face was not "chocolatey" enough. There's no such thing as normal. Normal is just another word for lifeless. All the names you give yourself, all those that others call you are just labels. You're not defined by them no matter how flattering or uncomplimentary they are. What defines you, genuinely, is your heart. Don't ever treat your little insanities as if they're aberrations that ought to be hidden from the rest of the world. Acknowledge them and use them to define your own way of living. The only life you have. All the most beautiful people in the world, the most creative, the ones who led revolutions, who discovered and invented things did so because they embraced their own idiosyncrasies.

Madness of the particularly nice or romantic kind is an absolute prerequisite to a happy and successful life. Don't let your fears become boxes that enclose you. Open them out. Feel them and turn them into the greatest courage you are capable of. I promise you nothing will go wrong, but if you live by your fears everything that can possibly go wrong will go wrong. In other words no matter how bad it gets life is the miracle you're searching for. There is no other one around the corner. Develop the faith and let it take its own course. Make all the efforts you can to abide by its beauty and it will not let you down. Use every resource you have been given. Your mental faculties, the ability of your heart to love and feel for those around you. Your health and good fortune all of the thousands of gifts life has given you to the maximum potential.

Honor your life. Please. Honor each gift and each moment by not laying it to waste. There is no real measure of success in this world except the ability to make good of life's endowments to you. Love, love people. Love the world around you. Love animals and birds and big cities and mountains. Love dreams, but most importantly my friends, love yourselves. Embrace all that this life has in store for you. Let your heart be as deep as the deepest ocean and as wide as the furthest horizon. Live as hearty as you can in this very moment. Live now. Live today. You will not see it with your youthful eyes but now is as much time as you will ever get because tomorrow we will all be dead. Just in case there is no cycle of rebirth, et cetera, why take a chance? I want to let you all know that how important your today is. Your now is. Study hard, work hard, play harder. Remember, however many times you go wrong no matter how many times you fail, despair, feel like this world is against you? Never, ever, live somebody else's dream.