As Ryan Stream, an award-winning professional speaker, musician, and two-time war veteran, prepares to go onstage for a performance in front of university students, he’s clearly jazzed up. He’s popping with energy, and he stops to talk with everyone he passes, thanking them for their help. His wife is with him for this show, and she gently pushes him forward, reminding him that his audience is waiting. They squeeze hands, and he steps briskly onto the stage to applause, ready to spend the next hour telling his life story, playing the piano, and relating how positive thinking saved his life and can save anyone else’s, too.
Ryan, once homeless and in prison, is traveling the country and the world to inspire others to change how they think. “It is crucial that we think positively, learn about how to take better care of our mental health, and practice leadership in our lives,” he tells his audience. “What goes through our minds directly influences the decisions we make, and if you can change the quality of your thoughts and become more positive, you’ll start attracting the kind of success you’ve been looking for.”
Ryan did not always have such a healthy mindset. He tells the audience that he was born to drug-addicted parents who lived in Los Angeles’ toughest ghetto. “That was not Beverly Hills, believe me,” he says. “Drugs, shootings, gangs – you name it, it was there. My parents made really bad decisions that led to addictions, jail time, and the loss of their family. I could hear gunfire on the streets when I went to sleep at night.”
He says that his life didn’t get any better when he moved with his family to Colorado and then Utah. “One of the low points was when I had napped under a bridge,” Ryan remembers. “I was so tired that I just threw my backpack on the ground and used it as a pillow as I slept. We even lived in a shack-like shed behind a relative’s home for a while. All of this was going on as I grew up, some of the most foundational years of your life. These experiences were making me believe that my life would always be this way and that I would never experience anything better.”
While Ryan was intelligent, he had an undiagnosed learning disability that haunted him in school. “I was always the kid who didn’t want to be called on,” he states. “The first kid to be eliminated from spelling bees, the last kid to finish a multiplication table – I didn’t stand out academically. My grades were terrible and got worse from there.”
Ryan’s parents continued to succumb to their poor choices. His family was torn apart when Ryan’s father was arrested. “Then, in the ninth grade, my mom passed away from suicide,” says Ryan quietly. “That really hurt me inside, as you can imagine. I suddenly found myself in the foster care system without any of my siblings, and that put me on an even tougher road. My foster parents tried to help, but the reality was that I was suffering from being separated from my siblings. I struggled a lot and had anxiety, depression, behavioral issues, and academic problems. As you can guess, I was the kid who didn’t have a lot of good friends at school.”
Many children stay in the foster care system for years, but Ryan was fortunate: he was adopted by a police officer and a school teacher. “That was awesome for me,” Ryan relates. “What was even more incredible was that he adopted my three brothers, too, and we were reunited to become a loving, very close family of thirteen members.”
Even so, Ryan would continue to battle his inner demons and academics. Once he graduated from high school, he fell into drugs and alcohol. “It was one wrong choice after another that just snowballed into multiple arrests and jail time,” he sighs. “The court fines were through the roof – $25,000+ at one point, and I definitely didn’t have that kind of money on me. I also had nowhere to stay and ended up couch-surfing or living in my car.”
The turning point came when he joined the military, though he would still face enormous challenges. Ryan was deployed twice to Afghanistan and entered the harrowing world of war and combat. “I went out with a sapper unit and our mission was to locate and destroy I.E.D.s,” he relates. He was deployed with a round of 32 soldiers in his platoon. “I won’t ever forget the sound and the force of the explosions when the I.E.D.s went off. Around 23 of my buddies in my platoon had their vehicle hit with an I.E.D. Sadly, one was killed in my unit.”
Ryan pauses a moment before continuing. “There is no way to describe what war is like. You see the best and the worst in humanity and in yourself. When I came home, I couldn’t forget any of it. I struggled with PTSD and almost lost my family. I finally fell to my knees and made the choice to change what was going on in my mind so that I wouldn’t lose my wife or children.”
Once Ryan decided to change the trajectory of his life by changing his thoughts, his life took off. In the first year, he read 54 books to educate himself and broaden his understanding of the world, people, and himself. He also discovered that he had a passion for bringing a message of positive thinking to others. “I had a horrible childhood, and my start to adulthood wasn’t all that much better,” Ryan says. “I learned, though, that the future was still ahead of me. I could accomplish anything I wanted to if I was willing to change the quality of my thoughts. That’s what I did. I went from $0 to six figures in that year, and I’m talking to anyone who wants to improve their life just like I did.”
Ryan has multiple sources of income and finds joy in helping others stand up with purpose and focus to obtain the same rewards. He is developing his career as a multitalented motivational speaker, model, actor, pianist, and musician who performs in front of packed crowds. He travels the world, talking about how to overcome adversity, have a healthier mentality, and stay positive with adults at real estate conferences in Mexico, inside prisons, and at universities and with youth at high school assemblies, elementary schools, and concerts. He has been featured in dozens of magazines including Valor magazine, Entrepreneur, Yahoo!, Influencive, Marketwatch, and been honored with multiple awards for music and speaking. He had already released a third album called Front Pages and was awarded Best Video of the Year and People’s Choice at the LDS Film Festival.
Ryan is a born performer, and he uses his musical talent to connect with his audience. “I have a song for every situation I’ve been in,” he explains. “Some are rap songs while others are country or a different genre.” His lyrics talk about suicide, drug addiction, his desire to be a hero as he grew up, and the importance of never forgetting about how to dream. He amazes his audience with his talent for playing the piano blindfolded and also upside down.
It hasn’t always gone smoothly, however. “The first time I got on stage, I completely forgot the music because I have memory problems,” he says. “People laughed and said I wouldn’t make it, but guess what? I didn’t listen to them, and here I am today.”
As Ryan finishes his university show, he leaves the students with a few final thoughts to ponder. “Are you truly happy with how your life is going? Or are you settling? Many people are settling, and if that’s you, ask yourself why that is. What is that dream you had that fired you up and made you want to take on the world? Challenge yourself to find that passion again and to believe that you can do it. That’s when you’ll see your life slide into place and the law of attraction take over.”
To book Ryan, go to RyanStream.com and find any other information on him or watch his videos, type his name in the google search.
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