Empowering others to recognize the incredible potential that lies within
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Meet Danny
Danny was a songwriter, avid guitar player, actor, worship leader, and preacher when all that changed in one morning. On October 17, 2017, Danny woke as usual but soon knew something was desperately wrong. His wife, Elizabeth, drove him quickly to the hospital where he sat down in a wheelchair at the emergency room entrance never to get up again. Within 6 ½ hours, he was paralyzed from the chest down even losing the ability to project his voice and use his hands. Walking was one thing, but for a singer, songwriter, musician, and preacher, this seemed like everything was lost in an instant.
It took more than 10 days after a catastrophic crash on day five before Danny was diagnosed with the rare condition Transverse Myelitis, and he began the arduous task first to survive then to learn how to live inside a body very foreign to him and minus all the skills he had relied upon his whole life. While Danny will never regain his ability to walk or use his hands like before, he has learned to lean on the one gift that even quadriplegia could not steal, his ability to speak and connect with an audience.
Danny returned to the pulpit just days out of his two month stay in ICU and the rehabilitation hospital. He said that if he could wear a microphone so the people could hear, he would keep on speaking; and that is just what he has done. Danny’s message of finding your “one thing” has inspired so many to find and focus on that one thing they have unique to them and use it to bring hope and healing to the community around them. He encourages his listeners to never give up and to keep fighting through the challenges they face, because it is on the other side of those challenges where hope resides. As he says, “Seize the moments, because only by seizing the moments can you seize the day. And that’s how we can bring healing to the community around us.”
KEYNOTE ADDRESSES
Danny’s uncanny ability to tailor a message for an event, audience, venue, or occasion is unquestionably one of his strongest traits that endears him to his listeners as he connects his story of reinvention to theirs.
Play Your Cards or Fold
Life doesn’t always go as expected. Things happen that change our circumstances. When this happens we have two choices really, play our cards or fold. Too many people fold because they’re allowing their circumstances to happen to them, thus placing them in a negative place where life seemingly becomes meaningless. The question I have is, what happens when we allow our circumstances to happen for us?
Finding a Way
Some people say, “I can’t” because of all the doubt and fear the world places on them. Some people say, “I can’t” because they’ve been doing the same thing day after day, month after month, year after year. Some people say, “I can’t” because they simply don’t believe that what’s put in front of them is possible.
We all have different attributes and abilities. In a world that seems to lead our beliefs to a place of “I can’t” we must learn how to harness and shape our attributes and abilities to help us, “find a way” and when we do life happens and dreams come true!
Seize in the MOMENTS
Life is made up of moments. Moments make the hours, hours make the day, days make the week, weeks make the month, months make the years which all adds up to life. How we answer the question, what do you do with that, defines our moments. One answer leads to more questions that cause our “paralysis” to paralyze our lives. The other answer is already within us that sets us free to live and bring hope to this world.
"Danny Gilroy, one of Alabama's most impressive motivational speakers, captured the audience when he used his own physical challenges to make the point: 'It's not how high the ball falls, it's how high it bounces.'
Danny connects with his audience--through his charm, delivery and compelling story of courage driven by HOPE!"
Jack Hawkins, Jr. Ph. D.
Chancellor, Troy University
