Translator: Charlotte Handford Reviewer: Denise RQ
Hello.
I don't feel very comfortable.
I get the impression I didn't go to school enough.
"Beyond the limits."
When I was asked the question
what I had done to go beyond the limits,
I wondered.
I wondered for a few minutes, then a few hours.
I needed to have a flashback.
And this flashback brought up the question of doors.
It will seem stupid to you, but doors.
I was living in a neighborhood in the 70s,
a huge block of council flats that you're familiar with,
what we call today the political neighborhoods.
And my world was the stairwell.
I drop out of school,
and go from staircase A to staircase B.
The gang is growing at staircase C, etc., etc.
Frustration, and at times violence too,
create quite a toxic and anxiety-inducing flame.
My mum tells me,
"Rather than quarreling or scrapping on the street,
do it in the right setting."
A lucky break: judo.
And so judo was a very small door that was opening.
The teacher, a former judo champion, opens the door of the dojo.
The dojo was marvelous
because I understood that there were codes.
While I didn't have my own codes, there I had to respect them.
Then I easily understood things, through practice.
I call it the rule of the three Ms:
Mimicry, Memory, Mastery.
Wow!
I understood what I was being asked.
I could focus my energy,
and I was starting to look ahead,
and to move away from the gang that I was in.
So, with mimicry, memory, mastery,
I resume some semblance of confidence.
I feel a little stronger, a little bigger,
not stuck in the universe that I was in,
not resigned to this world of petty crime.
Sport - yes, passion for sport - yes, passion for judo - yes.
But not studying sports.
School: rotten.
Everything that I heard before threw me off a bit.
Rotten school, which means learning, means a profession.
You realize, I'd heard for years and years
of workers moulded in mass.
And I meet a mentor,
he's a carpenter,
a mentor who tells me,
"No, no, if you want to join us, there are codes."
I get it.
Here, it's about the nobility of the worker.
So, you have to deserve it.
And there are three keys, three keys, three important ones:
rigor,
- but I'm not talking about precision, more like a project;
like a social project, like a personal project -
engagement, stature, presence
- looking at the journey in front of you, that is what mentoring is.
That's what the Tour de France is -
and third, regularity: doing it every day.
I'll be proud and happy in this community of men
who will take me beyond my limits.
I had left the stairwell, I had left the estate,
I had left my town.
I'm discovering France,
and all of its teaching abilities.
Great.
And on this journey, I'd learned to accept certain frustrations.
The death-knell tolls for 18 years.
You'll look at me like an old man,
but we were going to be called
to do our three days of military service.
A step back: unacceptable.
I'm going back to an estate which no longer knows me.
That's not what I want.
I want to leave this estate.
I want to remove myself from my social status.
With my the sheet summoning me in my hands,
at the first army recruitment center
I come across an man, an officer, who says to me,
"Do you do sport?" "Yes."
"Do you do judo?" "Yes."
"Then the Marines are for you.
If you want to travel, join."
Wow! Join the marines!
There was a globe there.
"If you are feline and know how to move, you'll be airlifted."
(Laughter)
The portrait of General Bigeard,
flexible and feline-like,
flexible and resistant like leather.
Wow! That's me.
Great.
I sign up.
In the two situations that I just brought up,
each time, what helped me
was to accept letting go of the past.
That was my greatest pride,
because it was my biggest difficulty:
letting go of the past, to move forward, calm, and straight,
as General Loth said.
Military projection, operation, end of a military career.
OK, I'm getting there.
I spoke of my flashbacks.
At Austerlitz Station, with my backpack,
I'm no longer military, no longer really a civilian.
I learned things with my comrades.
I learned a sense of honor; very rare.
Loyalty,
and that nothing is gained without sacrifice.
So, I had my pack.
What was sustaining me was when I broke all of this down.
I said to myself, "It's funny.
I have this strength, but not a dime."
I didn't have a dime.
But I felt that 80% of my being was stronger.
I told myself, "I'm going to engage,"
like we do in climbing - use initiative,
or in judo, another movement, another hold.
The solution was in the movement.
Again, I accept letting go of the past,
to look at my project, my future.
So, fortunately,
this position led me to a few distinctions.
Chef of the year.
A Michelin star.
Then a second.
Nationally and internationally recognized.
Developing businesses, companies.
But when I told you that I needed to cut ties with the past,
there was always a little thread like that,
something tickling me,
which was pulling my shoulders a little, like that.
I told myself,
"Again, what have you retained from life's ordeals?
That life is a sport?
Yes, a combat sport.
How is a combat sport learned?
Mimicry, Memory, Mastery.
How do you stay like that?
Rigor, a project, engagement, consistency.
You have all of that.
You've succeeded."
I still have projects,
but there were still a few threads from the past
that I didn't know how to cut.
Cutting them is an art.
The Japanese say, "Tameshigiri, the art of cutting."
So I tell myself, "Right, I'll go back."
40 years later, I go back to the neighborhood.
And I said to myself, "I'm going to pass on these keys."
They aren't just for me, I need to pass them on."
Because I am deeply convinced
that there is no person
and no neighborhood made for failure.
So, if it worked for me, it will work for others.
And so we created these schools, a how-to guide
to cooking, to baking, to the service industry.
In our schools, the first thing is clear:
your past doesn't interest us.
Tell us about your project, not about your qualifications,
your qualifications are the result of a project.
And at the bottom of the sheet you sign: R.E.R.
We know what that stands for:
Rigor, Engagement, Reality.
And that is what works in our schools today.
94% of people who accept that
go back to their project, back to work.
That's what I wanted to tell you today, with lots of humility:
Mimicry, Memory, Mastery.
Rigor, Engagement, Regularity.
Separating with the past is an art;
it's tameshigiri.
Look ahead, calm and straight,
like General Loth said.
Thank you.
(Applause)