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Comedian treats KAH Women's Health Symposium audience with motivational talk that mixes homor with reflection on attitude
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| Comedian and motivational speaker Julie Burney gives her best “cheesecake” smile Tuesday during the keynote address at the Keokuk Area Hospital Women’s Health Symposium. The event was held at the First Christian Church. |
By Cindy Iutzi/Gate City Staff Writer
Comedian and motivational speaker Julie Burney delivered a message with well-motivated humor Tuesday at the Keokuk Area Hospital Women's Health Symposium.
The crowd needed to be lightened up some after consuming lasagna and cheesecake immediately after a seminar about abdominal fat. Laugh or cry were the choices, and Burney led the audience to laughter.
She started out with a look back to her days of struggling to lose weight and a strict 800 calorie-a day diet.
“I had a weight loss problem, but now I carry my weight with me and it's no problem,” she said. “I worked on it hard. I was eating 800 calories a day but I had to quit because I was already up to January 2009.”
She did get thin after a regimen of five to six hours of exercising a day, went home to the farm in Nebraska and expected everyone to comment on her thin shape. But no one mentioned her new look until she solicited a remark. One of Burney's brothers said, “You know, Julie, you look good, but you looked good before.”
The comment registered with Burney. Here was a new way of looking at herself. She never forgot the new perspective and began sharing the news with others.
“I was devaluing myself,” she said. “We struggle about things that are not important to struggle about. We need to recognize we are winners. Everyone has their own issues.”
It occurred to Burney one day as she walked in from the mailbox that “how can I feel bad about myself when every day I get so much mail saying, ‘you are a winner.'”
An advocate of women standing up for themselves, she said, “too often we look outside of ourselves. We need to do it from the inside out. We need to give our best to ourselves.”
She said there is a difference between being egotistical and taking care of and being good to oneself.
Attitude is vital in keeping a healthy perspective and keeping healthy as well, Burney said. She used an example of a red stop light that is only given value by a person's reaction to its message. When people are not late and encounter the red light it's no big deal. But some will curse the red light, even though cursing does not have the power to affect the change they desire.
“We make choices,” she said. “We choose to be crabby and upset over things we have no control over. If we choose to get crabby over things we have no control over, it's like taking poison and hoping someone else will die.”
The same choices are valid in communication with others, but have the power to affect lives for better or for worse.
“We have power within ourselves to communicate differently,” she said.
Burney grew up on the family livestock farm with parents with good senses of humor.
“For a long time I thought we were raising S.O.B.s, because that's what my father always called them,” Burney explained.
Later she told of her father's death a couple of years ago, when his last words to his children were about raising cattle, which he loved, and the importance of them loving what they were doing.
Bourney started her career in comedy in 1985 and tours the nation as a headlining performer at hundreds of well-known comedy clubs. She performs at private shows and delivers her motivational speeches, such as the one at the health symposium, with palatable wit and relevant wisdom.
In addition to receiving a number of awards and honors related to her speaking, Burney is an assistant professor in communication and theater at Doane College in Lincoln, Neb.
In her 20 years there, she has been chosen teacher of the year five times.
“They retired my jersey,” Burney said.
She gave homework as a professor is wont to do: “Remember how wonderful you are. It is a blessing to be here today; it's a blessing to be anywhere today. Keep a journal of anything positive that happens in the day - ‘at least I didn't get hit by a truck.' Remember, if you laugh, it changes your thinking. We need to recognize how special we are. We have the ability to live in each moment, and lighten up. Don't take things personally.”
Her parting words that are relevant to only those who attended were: “When you're crabby, stressed, down on yourself remember - zip, zip, zip.”
The crowd needed to be lightened up some after consuming lasagna and cheesecake immediately after a seminar about abdominal fat. Laugh or cry were the choices, and Burney led the audience to laughter.
She started out with a look back to her days of struggling to lose weight and a strict 800 calorie-a day diet.
“I had a weight loss problem, but now I carry my weight with me and it's no problem,” she said. “I worked on it hard. I was eating 800 calories a day but I had to quit because I was already up to January 2009.”
She did get thin after a regimen of five to six hours of exercising a day, went home to the farm in Nebraska and expected everyone to comment on her thin shape. But no one mentioned her new look until she solicited a remark. One of Burney's brothers said, “You know, Julie, you look good, but you looked good before.”
The comment registered with Burney. Here was a new way of looking at herself. She never forgot the new perspective and began sharing the news with others.
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It occurred to Burney one day as she walked in from the mailbox that “how can I feel bad about myself when every day I get so much mail saying, ‘you are a winner.'”
An advocate of women standing up for themselves, she said, “too often we look outside of ourselves. We need to do it from the inside out. We need to give our best to ourselves.”
She said there is a difference between being egotistical and taking care of and being good to oneself.
Attitude is vital in keeping a healthy perspective and keeping healthy as well, Burney said. She used an example of a red stop light that is only given value by a person's reaction to its message. When people are not late and encounter the red light it's no big deal. But some will curse the red light, even though cursing does not have the power to affect the change they desire.
“We make choices,” she said. “We choose to be crabby and upset over things we have no control over. If we choose to get crabby over things we have no control over, it's like taking poison and hoping someone else will die.”
The same choices are valid in communication with others, but have the power to affect lives for better or for worse.
“We have power within ourselves to communicate differently,” she said.
Burney grew up on the family livestock farm with parents with good senses of humor.
“For a long time I thought we were raising S.O.B.s, because that's what my father always called them,” Burney explained.
Later she told of her father's death a couple of years ago, when his last words to his children were about raising cattle, which he loved, and the importance of them loving what they were doing.
Bourney started her career in comedy in 1985 and tours the nation as a headlining performer at hundreds of well-known comedy clubs. She performs at private shows and delivers her motivational speeches, such as the one at the health symposium, with palatable wit and relevant wisdom.
In addition to receiving a number of awards and honors related to her speaking, Burney is an assistant professor in communication and theater at Doane College in Lincoln, Neb.
In her 20 years there, she has been chosen teacher of the year five times.
“They retired my jersey,” Burney said.
She gave homework as a professor is wont to do: “Remember how wonderful you are. It is a blessing to be here today; it's a blessing to be anywhere today. Keep a journal of anything positive that happens in the day - ‘at least I didn't get hit by a truck.' Remember, if you laugh, it changes your thinking. We need to recognize how special we are. We have the ability to live in each moment, and lighten up. Don't take things personally.”
Her parting words that are relevant to only those who attended were: “When you're crabby, stressed, down on yourself remember - zip, zip, zip.”
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