As a youth mentor, Hoan Do travels around the country empowering students to “change the station” on the negative self-talk in their heads that says, “You aren’t good enough, smart enough, or experienced enough.’”

“That negative self-talk comes from something in our past that was so intense, it stuck with us,” stated Hoan, who has spoken to every incoming freshman class for the last four years at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. “One time a student stood up and said, ‘I won’t ever amount to anything because my parents and step-parents have said this to me all the time. That’s not true though because I am standing here right now.’ At that moment, 800 students started cheering for him. It gave me chills and my eyes got teary. That is the reason why I do what I do. That moment will have a dramatic impact and be anchored in that young man’s memory.”

In Vietnamese, Hoan’s name means ‘happy’ and ‘new beginning’ and his birth signified that for his family. His father, Van Do, served as a fighter pilot in the Vietnam War and after it ended, he was taken away by the Vietnamese Communist government and be put into a re-education camp (trại học tập cải tạo) with inhumane living conditions for four years. His father did not even see his firstborn son (Hoan’s brother) until the child was four years old. After getting out of re-education camp, the family escaped Vietnam and the communist regime by relocating to Tacoma Washington in 1984. A year later, Hoan was born.

Ever since Hoan was a junior in high school, he knew that he was going to be a public speaker, inspiring others to pursue their own dreams. “I believe creating your own destiny is possible, it’s just about figuring out what fits for your life. To me, it is similar to how some clothes and styles fit you, but others don’t. I want to help other people come to that place of realization to take risks and try a variety of things.”

PEPPERDINE

“There is a saying that you don’t value something until you pay for it. Pepperdine University is a high-dollar school,” he commented. “I was only able to go there because of financial aid and scholarships. And I was determined to maximize that opportunity.”

Hoan decided to major in economics like many of his upperclassmen mentors and those who had already graduated from college. “They taught me that the entrepreneurial life is about real-world experience. Public speaking was really scary to me at the time,” he recalled. “I knew if I wanted to be good at it, I had to practice it just like in sports, and learn from others who were doing it. So one day during freshman year, I slipped into the business school to see the top salesperson from Malibu speak, and it really enhanced my college experience.”

Another advantage of being an economics major was that it required fewer credits than a business degree. Being a student wrestling athlete, I had to make sure that I had more free time than most students,” he said. “I took summer classes at Pepperdine and a community college. I had the foresight from mentors and books that I had read to space out my time and make sure I wasn’t overwhelmed with the college experience.”

“I really felt like for what I want to do – spending all my time in class was not productive,” he continued. “A lot of high school and college students try to be involved in everything. I allowed myself to do the things I wanted to do with the focus on how do I get experience that will help me in the real world.”

He took a variety of different classes and frequently went into other classes to learn from expert speakers. “My college experience was certainly not a traditional one,” he laughed. “I took an acting class, voice lesson class, sailing, surfing, and would make it a point to find the top professors so I could see them speak. There was an advertising class taught by a professor who had worked with Warner Brothers. I was focused on the real-life experience that people had.”

LEARNING THROUGH CHALLENGES

“Part of my message is about how having a positive attitude is easier said than done. Hoan acknowledged. “In every person’s story, there are setbacks. That is the reality. Whether it was my loss in the state wrestling championship in high school, suicidal thoughts from too much pressure to succeed or even getting rejected four times applying to be a tour guide at Pepperdine, I had my own setbacks before even graduating from college.”

The wrestling loss from his days at Decatur High School in Federal Way, Washington, is one he speaks about often to help people decide if they are making decisions out of faith or fear in their own lives. “I wrestled in the Washington State Wrestling Championships. I was winning my match 4-0. At the halfway point, rather than continuing to increase my lead, I got scared,” he shared. “I didn’t want to make any mistakes so rather than wrestling to win, I was wrestling to not lose. I made some mistakes and eventually lost the match 5-4. Looking back on this experience, the powerful lesson I learned is to play the game of life to win versus not to lose. In other words, to choose faith over fear.”

One month after college graduation, Hoan took a position with Tony Robbins’ company, a world-renowned personal development and public speaking organization. “I was one of the youngest people in the company and I looked even younger than I was,” he said, noting the disadvantage. “I was one of the worst sellers in the company and I was about to get fired. Meanwhile, I went through $20,000 of savings to write a book. I spent all the money on coaching and editors for the book and was in credit card debt.”

His book, Succeeding in the Real World: What School Won’t Teach You, was published by the University of Washington in 2009. “I felt like I was suffering from ‘imposter syndrome’ he stated. The impostor syndrome, also called impostor phenomenon, was first described by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Suzanne Imes in 1978, defining it as the idea that your success was not due to your talent or qualifications. “It forced me to let go of my ego and start making changes,” added Hoan. “I knew I needed to have money, while still pursuing my business.”

He began working as a Census worker, gathering information for the government, and as the coordinator for a student organization in Washington. But that wasn’t cutting it and he needed more income so he began working for Comcast as a door-to-door salesman. Hoan continued to struggle and shortly after being involved in a car accident, he found himself in the precarious position of having a sales meeting for Comcast at the same time as another meeting for a part-time position. “I had to come up with an excuse as to why I was leaving one meeting early and arriving at another meeting late,” he recalled. “I was not at a point in my life where I wanted to be and was not being 100% truthful. I was still committed to mentoring young people, so I quit my job at Comcast and ended up back in the same financial hole I was in before.”

He took on new jobs, doing telemarketing for the Tacoma City Ballet and started delivering phonebooks to wealthy areas of Washington State. “I remember getting up at 5:30a to deliver phone books. I was starting to have those same feelings of being an impostor, but a visit from a close friend set me on a new path,” Hoan relayed. “I realized that our biggest setbacks give us lessons for our biggest comebacks. It is a natural progression in life. Just as a muscle grows with resistance, so do we. If we aren’t adding on more weights, we are only maintaining instead of getting stronger.”

BREAKTHROUGHS

Hoan continued pushing through the hard times, working on his business, and reinvesting in the business with the money he was making. “Results were starting to happen. Schools started contacting me and I realized that all that hard work was paying off,” he recollected. “It was like a farmer sowing seeds and finally seeing growth. I was not going to allow doubts and negative self-talk take hold of me. It went back to making decisions based on faith and confidence, rather than on fear. I was playing to win, rather than not to lose.”

When Hoan changed that mindset, things picked up quickly and he began traveling all over the country, speaking at schools, conferences, and events. Working for Tony Robbins, he spoke to 100 organizations in a 1½ years, always speaking to adults. But what he really wanted to focus on was speaking to students. “I wanted to help give them the tools I wish I had when I was their age,” commented Hoan, who estimates he speaks at colleges and universities 70 percent of the time, high schools 25 percent, and middle schools or elementary schools five percent.

“The main difference between the audiences is maturity and brain development,” he described. “With college students, I can go more abstract and more detailed cognitively. High school is about the identity phase and how they see themselves. For middle school students, the message needs to be simpler with more energy.”

He laughs recanting about the time he spoke to elementary students in the U.S. Virgin Islands. “I was absurdly over-exaggerating and 10 times more engaged than usual,” he noted. “I had to make it super simple and fun. No matter what age I am speaking to, it is about meeting people where they are. Realistically, it is always the same type of information. I personalize how I say it. If I am speaking to adults, I talk about my professional life. If I am talking to middle schools, I talk about my time in middle school.”

Just a short time after he had been delivering phone books, his quick success in public speaking landed him recognition as the “Top Motivator” by Verizon Wireless at its third annual Asian Pacific American (APA) Heritage Bash in May of 2011. Later that year, he was chosen as the “Best Youth Mentor” by the International Examiner in its annual Reader’s Choice Awards.

AMERICAN NINJA WARRIOR

Having always been an athlete, competing in both basketball and wrestling in high school and continuing to wrestle at Pepperdine, Hoan jumped at the opportunity to compete in American Ninja Warrior, a television program where competitors complete a series of obstacle courses in various cities across the U.S.

“I have always been competitive. One day, I was on a climbing wall and a friend snapped a photo of me, and tagged it with ‘American Ninja Warrior,’ he recalled. “I did a quick google search to find out more about the show and the application process required a three-minute video showcasing yourself. A group of my friends and I put together a video that we were very proud of.”

He was selected to appear in season six of the series and looked to a former contestant for advice. “He told me ‘Don’t get hurt.’ I thought that was rather obvious,” he quipped. Unfortunately for Hoan, getting hurt was exactly what happened. “The week before the show, I was on a trampoline, landed awkwardly, and snapped my ankle. All these doubts starting flooding into my head. I thought competing was going to be impossible”

But instead of withdrawing, he pushed back on those initial negative self-limiting thoughts and became determined to still compete at a high level. “I was committed to the end goal,” he said. “I did physical therapy every day. I did acupuncture. I knew I had to keep moving or it would stiffen up and I pushed through the pain.” Hoan ended up advancing to the semifinals of the Venice (California) city competition. “Looking back, I am grateful for that experience. I talk about it when I speak. Young people are familiar with the show and I can talk about overcoming that injury.”

PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE

Hoan is already preparing for the future, personally and professionally. On August 18, 2018, he married Anh Thu, four years after the two met at a conference in Dallas where he was speaking. Three years to the day of that initial meeting, Hoan proposed to her:

“Once again, I have to be conscious of whether I am making choices out of faith or fear,” he said. “It can be overwhelming to think about having a family and what that entails. Together, we are making decisions based on the faith that things will work out.”

Eventually, Hoan plans to develop an online course, develop more video content, and start writing again. His immediate strategy is recruiting other people online through a program called Youth Speaking Pro (YSP). “I want to teach others who have a message to do what I do. I want to develop speakers to live out where their purpose and calling is so that more people will be touch,” he commented. “Some people may resonate with me, while others may resonate more with someone else. There is no one way to share stories with students. There are others who can touch people who I may not be able to reach. It will also allow me to not travel as much and spend as much time as possible with my future family.”

Whatever his future role looks like, Hoan knows he is on the right path. “Empowering others is what I have been called to do. It’s not even an option in my head,” he concluded. “On trips where I am taking a red-eye, waking up at 4 a.m. and then making a two-hour drive, it is what I am supposed to do. Those aspects aren’t great, but life doesn’t always care about that. It is about having a great purpose.”