Last Tuesday, Black Student Union gathered for their usual after school meeting in the MHS Alumni Conference Room. However this time, they had a guest speaker. Kansas State BSU member Caleb Taylor opened up his lecture with the quote from the Disney classic “The Incredibles” from Elastigirl herself, “Your identity is your most valuable possession. Protect it.” He then followed it up with the question: how do you identify yourself?

“I’m still trying to identify myself because when I was younger, I would let people identify myself and I feel like identity is something that you should give to yourself,” junior and BSU Vice President Adanna Okere said. “And so, I mean, I would identify myself as unique, I guess. I’ve always been, like, a lot different than a lot of my family members.”

Taylor stressed just how essential protecting your identity is.

“Your identity is the most valuable thing that you have,” Taylor said. “I say all the time that two of the most valuable things you have in this world is your name and your word. Your name, because that’s what people identify you with–that’s your identity. My last name is Taylor so people might know me as Mr. Taylor, ‘okay yeah I know him, I know where’s he’s from and I know what he’s about’ and your word, if you say you’re going to do something, you have to do it, you know?”

Taylor also noted that your name and your word go hand in hand. If you’re word goes down, your name goes down and vice versa.

“When you make a commitment and you give your word to it, you have to follow through with it. Because if you don’t, you start to fall from a chain of neglect, a chain of falling through your word and then people can’t depend on you and that’s when you’re name goes down.”

Taylor not only talked about why it was important to protect your identity, but that your future, especially college, and decisions depend on who you are and who you want to be. He mentioned that good habits have to start now so students easily achieve their goals in college.

“You’re your success and you’re your own failure. You’re your own worst enemy,” Taylor said. “Life is not a sprint, life is a marathon. Each day is a day you race, each day is a day you have to make a decision, ‘I’m going to be the best I can be. I’m going to be nothing less than my best self.’ Each day you have to give the most effort. That means getting the most out of your classes. You might not realize this now, but everything that you’re learning now, you’re going to have to use when you get to college.”

Furthermore, Taylor encouraged the members to get out of their comfort zone and continue to stay true to who they are as individuals.

“You’re going to have to stop having to be scared of who you are, but just be who you are,” Taylor said. “So don’t get caught up in, ‘somebody wants me to be this, somebody wants me to be that, my parents want me to be this’, people want the best for you, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they know the best way. You’re going to have to pick out what’s the best way for you.”

Taylor also emphasized how building a good reputation and treating people with respect will help you go far.

“Never burn your bridges. I say that because there’s people I can still contact in high school and in their mind they’ll still say, ‘I remember Caleb, nice young man, always had manners, yes sir, no sir, yes ma’am, no ma’am’; simple things that I know go far. Just keeping a good report and your name is what I’m talking about. Your name and word … people will gladly bend over backwards to help you. So you never know what people know. So treat everybody equally [and] with the utmost respect.”

Taylor then closed his speech with a goal for each of the BSU members.

“Invite somebody new out of each class you go to [to a BSU meeting],” Taylor said. “Put your identity into action. The biggest reaction you can get out of someone is if you introduce yourself. You can’t be afraid to introduce [yourself]. You’re identity is who you are. You can’t protect what you don’t value.”

Jamera Ewing, junior and president of BSU, enjoyed what Taylor discussed.

“I loved him,” Ewing said. “[He was] very inspirational [and] motivational because, like, I was getting really discouraged by the lack of participation but he kinda lifted my spirits and he had a lot of like very good things to say so I was really glad he came.”

Okere also resonated with the messages Taylor voiced.

“I really liked the guest speaker,” Okere said. “He really encouraged me and I really liked the topic that he introduced us to. If you do not protect something, you do not value it. So that really opened my eyes into thinking, what are some things that I think that I value but I don’t protect, you know?

“I’m at the time in my life, you know, where I’m just like, ‘Okay, I need to figure out where I am and who I am in life.’ And, talking about stuff like this, I’m able to kind of contemplate, you know, about, like, ‘what am I doing?’ Am I doing this because, people are telling me I have to do this? Am I doing this because this is the societal norm? Or am I doing this because I actually care? Am I doing this because there’s a purpose? Because like the speaker said, everything that you do should have a purpose. And I don’t want to be going through the motions in life and just doing what people tell me, but actually doing things with a purpose.”