施瓦辛格清华大学《执着于你的梦想》英语演讲稿
Some of your families maybe don’t believe in your dreams.
But let me tell you something, myyoung friends. Keep your
dreams. No matter what, keep your dreams. Don’t give up on
them,even when you are temporarily defeated or denied. Keep your
dreams. Well, thank you very much, President. First of all, I
want to thank President Gu for having mehere, and I want to
thank Mr. Qizhi for your kind introduction. Thank you very much.
It is wonderful to be here at this university. What a special
place. I just looked around a littlebit here, it’s a gorgeous,
gorgeous place. I want to congratulate you for going to
thismagnificent university here. Now, the last time I was
here in China was five years ago, and then I was promoting
mymovies. They had a movie festival here, the Arnold
Schwarzenegger Movie Festival. I rememberthey showed all my
movies for a week—which was a rarity, may I remind you—and
they alsoshowed the movies on television. But we also were here
to promote Special Olympics, which isan organization that helps
people with mental disabilities, so I was here for both reasons.
But this time I’m here as the governor of the great state of
California. I’m here representingthe people of California, and
we’re here on a trade mission to see how we can do more
businesswith China and to help each other, because both
California is a very fast growing state, andChina is a very fast
growing country, and there are a lot of things that we can do
for oneanother. But I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to
come here today and to talk with the youngpeople; as a matter of
fact, to the brightest young people of China. And this is why it
is so greatto be here at the Tsinghua University, and I’m
honored that I was invited here. Now, I read a little bit
about the history of Tsinghua, and I learned that actually this
schooloriginally prepared students to attend universities in
America. Now, I also know that since theattack on our World
Trade Centers it has become more and more difficult to go to
theuniversities in America because you need to fill out all
kinds of paperwork now and you have toget visas, and it’s very
complicated, and you have to wait a much longer period of time
to goover there. But let me tell you, things are improving
already. I’ve heard that it’s easing up, therestrictions, and
it’s easier to get a visa. My young Chinese friends, I want to
tell you that incase no one from America has ever invited you,
let me do this right now personally. I want towarmly invite all
of you here to come to the United States, and especially to come
to California,because that’s the happening place. California is
the best place. Please come and visit us, we will welcome
you. I invite you all to come there and to travel, tomeet the
American people, and to come there and study in our
universities, and some dayhopefully you will come and do
business over there, or maybe you’ll want to move over
your goal is, you’re always welcome. America,
after all, let’s not forget, is the land ofopportunity. And
it’s not only the land of opportunity for Austrians like me,
but for Chinesepeople as well. Remember that. I know that
beginning with this century, China is also becoming a land of
opportunity. It’s afast growing place, and as the students of
this great university and the citizens of a risingChina, I think
that you have a great future also here in this country. And
today I want to talk toyou a little bit about the dreams, about
the dreams of your future, and dreams for this want to
talk to you a little bit about dreams, because it seems to me
that I’m somewhat of anexpert in dreams, because I had a lot of
my dreams become a reality. So let me just briefly tellyou my
story, and tell you a little bit about how I started with my
career. I think that this storykind of relates a little bit also
to you, and also to China. I started way back as a
weightlifter. I always liked the idea of lifting weights and
being abodybuilder. From the first moment when I gripped a
barbell and held it around the bar andlifted the steel up over
my head, I felt this exhilaration, and I knew then that this
issomething that I’m going to do; that I was in love with that,
and this is going to be somethingthat I’m going to do. I’m
going to pursue the sport of weightlifting and bodybuilding.
Now, I remember the first real workout that I had. Eight miles
away from my home village inAustria there was a gymnasium, and I
rode to that gymnasium with a bicycle. And there Itrained for
half an hour, because they said that after half an hour you
should stop becauseotherwise your body will get really sore. But
after half an hour I looked at my body, and nothinghad happened.
So I said, "I’d better work out for another half hour." So I
lifted some more. Mystrength didn’t improve, I didn’t see the
muscles pop out or anything like that, so I trained foranother
half an hour. And then after another half hour I trained another
half hour, and alltogether I trained two and a half hours.
Well, let me tell you something. After two and a half hours—
even though they told me that Ishouldn’t train that much or I
would get really sore—I left the gymnasium, I rode my
bicyclehome. And after the first mile I got numb, and I
couldn’t feel anymore the handle of thebicycle, and I fell off
the bike and I fell into the ditch on the side of the road. So I
got up againand I tried it again. Another few yards, I fell off
the bicycle again. And I tried it three, fourmore times, and I
just couldn’t ride my bicycle because my body was so numb and
my legs feltlike noodles. Well, let me tell you something.
The next morning when I got up, my body was so sore that
Icouldn’t even lift my arms to comb my hair. I had to have my
mother comb my hair, and youknow how embarrassing that is. But
you know something? I learned a very important lesson,that pain
means progress. Pain is progress. Each time my muscles were sore
from a workout Iknew that they were growing and they were
getting stronger. I think there is a real life lesson in
that. After two or three years of discipline anddetermination
and working out hard, I actually changed my body, and I changed
my that told me something; that if I could change
my body that much, and if I could changethe strength of my body
that much, then I could also change anything else. I could
change myhabits, I could change my intelligence, I could change
my attitude, my mind, my future, mylife. And this is exactly
what I have done. I think that that lesson applies to people,
and it alsoapplies to countries. You can change, China can
change, everyone in the world can change. My parents, of
course, I have to tell you, didn’t understand my dreams at all.
They werealways wondering, they said, "What is he doing? When
are you going to get a job, a real job?When are you going to
make money?" And all of those questions I got. And they said, "I
hopewe didn’t raise a bum, someone that doesn’t make money and
just wants to live in agymnasium and think about their bodies."
Well, I endured all of this negative thinking, and themore
negative the thinking got, and the more negative the questions
got, the stronger andthe more positive I became, the stronger I
became inside. So of course some of your families maybe think
the same way, and this is why I’m mentioningthat. Some of your
families maybe don’t believe in your dreams. But let me tell
you something,my young friends. Keep your dreams. No matter
what, keep your dreams. Don’t give up onthem, even when you are
temporarily defeated or denied. Keep your dreams. I remember
the first time I went to the United States and I was competing
in a competition,the World Championships in Bodybuilding. I
lost. I came in second, and I was devastated. Iwas crushed. I
felt like a loser, a major loser, let me tell you. I cried, as a
matter of fact,because I felt like I disappointed my friends and
I disappointed myself. But the next day Igot my act together, I
shifted gears, and I said, "I’m going to learn from that
lesson. I’m goingto stay here in America. I’m not going to go
back to Europe. I’m going to stay in America andI’m going to
train with the American champions, I’m going to train the
American way. I’mgoing to eat the American food, I’m going to
train with the American machines and theprinciples. And a year
later, in America, I became the World Champion in Bodybuilding.
So Ithink this is a very, very important lesson. And from
then on, I continued. My career took off, and everything that I
wanted to do Iaccomplished. First it was to become a champion in
bodybuilding. Later on I became a moviestar, to do all the great
movies, the Conan movies and the Terminator movies and all this.
ThenI became the governor of the great state of California, of
the sixth largest economy in the of this happened
because of my dreams, even though other people told me that
thosedreams were bogus and they were crazy, but I held onto my
dreams. And people would always say, no matter what, even in
bodybuilding they said I would nevermake it. And later on in the
movies, in Hollywood they said I would not make it. They said,
"Youwill never make it. You have a German accent. No one in
Hollywood has ever made it with aGerman accent. Yeah, maybe you
can play some Nazi roles or something like that, but youcannot
become a leading star with an accent. Plus your body, you’re
overdeveloped, you have allthese muscles. They did Hercules
movies 20 years ago, that’s outdated. Now it’s Woody
Allen is in, his body is in." And those were the
messages. "And Al Pacino, the skinny guy,he is in. But not your
body, it’s too big. And your name, Schwarzenegger, it will
never fit on amovie poster. Forget it. Forget it, you will never
make it. Go back to bodybuilding." Well, the rest is history.
After Terminator 3, I became the highest paid movie star in
let me tell you something, it continued on. Even
when I ran for governor people said, "Arnold, you will never
make it. You will never become governor of California. What do
you knowabout government?" Well, the fact is, I knew exactly as
much about government as the rest ofthe people knew in
California, which is that government is out of touch, and it’s
out of sync withthe people, and it needed a shakeup. So I
didn’t listen to all those people that said I wouldnever make
it. I continued campaigning, I listened to my dreams, and the
rest also is history. Ibecame governor. So always it just
carried me on, those dreams. So bodybuilding gave me the
confidence,movies gave me the money, and pubic service and being
a governor gave me a purpose largerthan myself. And that is the
brief story of my dreams and a brief story of my early life, and
howmy dreams made me successful. A person, of course, should
not be stingy with their dreams. So I, of course, don’t just
thinkand dream about myself, but I also have dreams for you, and
dreams for China. So let me justtalk a little bit about that.
China’s economy has become an engine of human progress,
liftingmillions of people out of poverty. This is a moral and
economic good for China and for the restof the world. I often
read that China’s economy is likely to become the largest in
the world overthe next 50 years, and I think this is terrific.
This does not mean, of course, that America willget poorer; it
just means that China will get richer, and the United States
will benefit fromChina’s progress as much as the . benefited
from the rise of Western Europe after WorldWar II. Some in my
country fear that China’s research and development will
overtake America’s, but Ibelieve that America and the world
will benefit from China’s scientific and technologicaladvances.
I think we will benefit from that. If China makes advances in
stem cell research, therest of the world will benefit from that.
If China discovers an energy breakthrough, this isgood for the
rest of the world, such as the benefit of a free market. Some
fear that China will buy up American companies, but that fear
also existed in the ‘80s,when America feared that Japan was
going to buy up American companies. So what? It was justgood,
and to the benefit of America. We should welcome China’s
investment in Americancompanies, just as we welcome the billions
of dollars that China has invested in . treasurybonds. This
shows that China has faith in America, and American investment
in China showsthat we have faith in you. So I believe that China
and . economic relations will become evencloser in the years
ahead. Certainly I realize that we do not agree on everything,
but who does?Certainly I realize that China has major hurdles to
overcome, but it is not for me to say howChina should overcome
those hurdles and achieve its dreams. But I can tell you,
however, what has given America such energy and strength over
the last 200years, and perhaps there are some insights in this
for China. America is a nation that believes inthe power of the
individual, and what the individual can accomplish, no matter
the color, nomatter the religion, no matter the ethnic
background of the individual. Recently, as you probably have
read, Rosa Parks, a former seamstress married to a
barber,married to a hairdresser, died, and she lay in honor in
the Rotunda of the . Capitol inWashington. People from around
America came to say farewell to her and to thank her forchanging
our history and for changing our society. Now, what did this 92
year-old black womando that deserved such great honor? What did
she do? Well, in 1955, the days of racialsegregation, she had
refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white man. She had
simple refusal to move to the back of the bus put
into motion events that led to mycountry’s great civil rights
movement. The small protest of a woman that maybe weighed
lessthan 100 lbs. brought down a racist system. As you can see,
the individual can make adifference. Let me tell you about
another individual, Ken Behring, a millionaire California
businessman whofound his passion in giving wheelchairs to poor
and physically disabled people all around theglobe, including
China. He says that he has met people who have spent years in
rooms with nowindow, just lying there and staring up at the
ceiling, never seeing the outside world unlesssomeone was
willing to pick up that person and take them outside to show
them the world. Hesays that it’s no wonder so many of those
physically disabled people dream about being a . Behring
says that most of us think that a wheelchair would be a
confinement, but tomillions of people it is not a confinement,
it is freedom, freedom to move and to go to school,freedom to
vote, freedom to get a job, and freedom for hope for the future.
He has givenfreedom and wheelchairs to 400,000 people around the
world. The individual can make adifference. My mother-in-law,
Eunice Kennedy Shriver—I always like to mention her, because it
gets me onthe good side of her—she, for instance, started an
organization called Special Olympics. Shestared Special Olympics
which is for people with mental disabilities. And of course when
shestarted that organization she was told by the experts,
"Don’t do it. You cannot take people withmental disabilities
out of mental institutions and have them participate in sports
will drown in the swimming pools. They will kill
each other out there, they will hurt eachother. Don’t do it."
But Eunice Kennedy Shriver had a dream and a passion, and today
millionsof people compete in Special Olympics around the world,
including right here in China. This iswhy I was here five years
ago. Five years ago you had 50,000 participants in the
SpecialOlympics. Today, five years later, you have 500,000
participants in Special Olympics. 500,000people are getting a
chance to participate in sports programs, getting a chance to
have healthcare, have a chance to be treated equally, with
respect and with tolerance. So Eunice KennedyShriver exemplifies
that the individual can make a difference. And I think what
I’m trying to say to you is that each and every one of you can
make adifference. So as you study and as you become smarter, and
as you become richer, think aboutthat, that there are millions
of people that need your help. Now, you maybe ask yourself
thequestion, what can I do? Well, let me tell you. Even though
you maybe have no money oranything, you can go out and help a
child that has not yet learned yet how to read. You maybecan go
out and help a person that is physically handicapped, to lift
them up and to take themoutside so they can see the world. There
are so many different things that you can do. Youmaybe can take
a person that is mentally disabled, to take them to a soccer
game. There are allkinds of things that the individual can do to
reach out and to help. Imagine what could be accomplished if
the dreams of China’s billion individuals could
beunleashed. Imagine what could happen. Each of you here has the
power of the individual withinyou, you have the power of your
dreams within you, and these are tremendous powers.
You’reyoung, you’re educated, and you are the very best China
has to offer. My young Chinesefriends, I believe in your dreams.
I believe that you can achieve them, and I believe you canmake a
difference, a big difference. All you have to do is just make
the commitment. All youhave to do is create the action and
commit, and say, "Let’s do it." Go out and do it. I’m
askingyou. Do it for yourself, do it for China, and do it for
the good of the world. Thank you very muchfor listening. Thank
you.
