Sam Demma

“Most of what is weighing you down was handed to you. You have been carrying opinions you never agreed with.”

The backpack image the whole book runs on — the load is real, but almost none of it is yours.

“Small consistent actions. Three words from a grade 12 teacher, and the entire operating system of the book.”

Demma's soccer career ended with an injury; his teacher Mr. Loudfoot handed him this instead of a consolation.

“One bag of litter on a Sunday is nothing. Three thousand bags is a movement. The difference is only ever the Sunday.”

PickWaste started as one person on one street, which is why Demma can use it as proof rather than as a parable.

“A dream dying is not the end of the story. It is the end of one route to it.”

Written by someone whose plan A ended at nineteen — the book treats setback as re-routing, not as a lesson.

“Keep the stories that lift you. Put down the ones that only ever made you smaller.”

The sorting instruction: not positivity, just an audit of what you agreed to carry.

“Motivation is what gets the backpack open. Consistency is what keeps it light.”

Demma is a keynote speaker who is unusually honest about the shelf life of a keynote.

“You are one conversation away from a completely different decade.”

The teacher took ninety seconds. The book's argument for saying the useful thing to someone else.

“Waiting to be qualified is just carrying the bag longer.”

Aimed squarely at young readers, and at anyone who has made 'not yet ready' into a permanent address.