Oprah Winfrey: The Queen of Talk… and Determination

What It Takes®

Academy of Achievement

Film, Politics, Arts, Self-help, Sports, Society & Culture, Success, Literature, Humanitarian, Military, Social Justice, Technology, Podcast, Achievement, Music, Science

4.6 • 943 Ratings

🗓️ 31 August 2015

⏱️ 19 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“Fourth grade is when I first began to believe in myself… I felt I could control the world.” On this episode of “What It Takes,” Oprah Winfrey talks frankly about the inner voice that allowed her to survive a trauma-filled childhood with unwavering focus and unrelenting determination, to become the top-ranking television talk show host of all time. She describes learning oration, at an age when most of us have yet to speak in full sentences. And she tells stories about intensely personal revelations she experienced WHILE she was on the air, interviewing other people. Oprah is currently the wealthiest African-American and the most philanthropic, but in this conversation, recorded in 1991, she defines her success in ways her fans might find surprising. (c ) American Academy of Achievement 2015

Transcript

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0:00.0	Madame, this child is gifted.
0:05.0	And I heard that enough that I started to believe it.
0:08.6	If you have the opportunity, not a perfect opportunity,
0:12.3	and you don't take it, you may never have another chance.
0:15.0	It all was so clear. It was just like the picture started to form itself.
0:19.7	There was no way in which a lie could prevail over the truth, darkness over light, birth over life.
0:27.0	Every day I wake up and decide. Today I'm going to love my life. Decide.
0:34.0	My advice is if they're going to break your leg once when you go in that place stay out of there.
0:39.0	And then along come these differential experiences that you don't look for, you don't plan for,
0:46.3	but boy you better not miss them.
0:52.4	Welcome to another episode of What It Takes, a podcast about Passion, Vision, and Perseverance
0:58.5	from the Academy of Achievement's Recorded Collection.
1:01.7	I'm Alice Winkler. On every episode of what it takes, we play you a revealing
1:06.4	conversation with someone who has literally changed the world. And mind you, a lot of people
1:11.1	say literally these days when they mean figuratively, but I mean literally, literally.
1:16.0	The Academy of Achievement has been recording these conversations for decades,
1:21.0	to document the extraordinary lives of people like Bill Gates, Alan Shepard, and
1:26.0	Hank Aaron, but mostly to show that all of us can learn what it takes to do a little better,
1:32.1	aim a little higher.
1:33.8	There is arguably no one alive who has built a bigger empire of inspiration
1:39.5	than Oprah Winfrey.
1:40.9	Or since America's on a first name basis with her Oprah.
	...

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