Demystifying Excellence:
The Cast Who Shaped My Story
 

My story, like many stories, is one of inspiration through unexpected tragedy. My name is Cory Cullinan — or, to kids, Doctor Noize. I’m a somewhat known family musician, author, and multimedia creator — known well enough to make a living at it. I’m also a former teacher and current soccer coach. I’ll start with how I got here, and then explain a few simple lessons I’ve learned that may help you get where you want to be, including a Sixth Cornerstone I’ve felt compelled to add since I first gave the speech.
 

I grew up a child of privilege in a world of opportunity. Perhaps you did too. I was raised in an upper middle class suburban family, right in the heart of Silicon Valley, in the same town that Steve Jobs grew up in — in fact, I met him several times when he became a mentor to my brother. I had a Leave It To Beaver / Cosby Kid / Walt Disney childhood. It was wonderful.
 

My mother was one of those very involved PTA moms. My father was the coolest dad possible — known to kids all over town as a fun-loving sports coach, and to parents as the Mayor of Los Altos. My brother Tracey was a computer whiz regarded as a genius. At the age of thirteen, Tracey worked as a salesman at ComputerLand; at the age of fourteen, he was a member of the national Atari Youth Advisory Board, which was a huge computer company at the time; by the time he was fifteen, Tracey was interviewed on the Today show by Jane Pauley as a young entrepreneur, a programmer with his own software company called Superior Software who billed clients at $25 an hour as a teenager in the 1980’s.
 

Me? I played a lot of sports.
 

But when I was a freshman at Los Altos High School, things changed. My brother had a seizure, and after a long process was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor. My father researched medical treatments, found Tracey the best doctors, and got him surgery to remove the tumor from his brain. It didn’t work. The tumor quickly spread, and Tracey gradually lost control of his limbs until it was clear he had only months left to live at 17.
 

My dad — a Stanford MBA and very successful business consultant — was used to achieving anything he put his mind to, and was irrationally stunned that he had been unable to save his son from cancer. My dad tried to numb his pain a number of ways, becoming a troubled alcoholic in the process. His whole personality changed. Perhaps the most poignant memory of my life was watching my 17-year-old brother, dying of cancer and unable to perform basic physical functions, looking my father steadily in the eye and telling him that he had to pull it together, be there for me and my mom, and get his life back together.
 

At that moment I realized that the wisest and strongest person I knew was 17 years old and on his deathbed. From then on, my wisdom was going to have to emanate from within — just like it did with my big brother. My mom was handling things with admirable strength, but I realized that she was going to have a lot to deal with moving forward. Boom. One moment. I was 15 years old. And I knew this was the moment when my childhood as I knew it was over, and it was now time for me to be like Tracey — to take full responsibility for my own perspective on life. To bring the weather with me.
 

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